Born on 1 January 1952

Back in 1952, life felt like it was finally twitching into colour, though the smog still clung to the brickwork of the terrace. If you stepped out for a pint of mild, everyone was talking about the young Queen; it was the year King George passed away, and suddenly we were all "New Elizabethans," even if we were still clutching our ration books for sugar and eggs. We’d huddle round the wireless for *The Archers*, but if you were lucky enough to have a telly with a screen no bigger than a postcard, you’d be glued to *What's My Line?

* or watching Bill and Ben the Flower Pot Men with the nippers. The kids were out in the street playing with metal hoops or swapping cards, while the cinema was packed for *The Quiet Man*. It was a chilly year, I recall—frightfully cold—leading up to that Great Smog in December where you couldn't see your own hand in front of your face.

But we kept warm with a sing-song to Vera Lynn’s "Forget-Me-Not," and if you had a few pennies left, you’d treat yourself to a Milky Way, which had just hit the shops. It was a simpler, slower world, scented with coal smoke and optimism.