21 Early 64

“Not too little, not too much, you’ve got a perfect loving touch,” sang Chris (the actor) Sandford as Walter (the character) Potts in TV’s Coronation Street. But Walter Potts was no name for a pop star so Dennis Tanner gave him the stage name of Brett Falcon... and a star was born. In real life, Chris Sandford did have a minor chart hit with the song and catchy little number it was too.

Other pop songs familiar to me were I Only Want to be With You, Swinging on a Star and a novelty song by the Singing Nun that sounded like she was singing Domineeky, neeky knickers on.

Another song that came to my attention was Needles and Pins by The Searchers. My ninth birthday at the end of January funded a stroll to Arnold’s toy shop to buy a couple of the latest swoppets. ‘Needles and pins-a, needles and pins-a,’ I heard a Saturday girl singing as I walked in. I also heard the catty comment that passed between two of her colleagues.

‘That’s the only bit she knows.’

Another record in the charts was Stay by The Hollies. Dean Hunter’s mum liked that one, I presumed,  because on the afternoon I was playing with Dean and his toy cars in the sunlit living room of their house on the corner of Crundale Road and Milsted Road, she sang along with it when it came on the her radio.

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At school, it wasn’t unusual to see boys with arms around each others shoulders chanting ‘We won the war, in 1944’ as they marched around the playground. This was often followed by a second chant of ‘who wants to play war?’

Highly unusual was the sight of Paul Parker, John Parker (not related), Clive Ward and Nigel Robinson standing together, strumming imaginary guitars and singing Beatles’ songs; yeah, yeah, yeah, but it was a sight I soon got used to.

Beatlemania was evident once more in the canteen, where a girl discussed personal favourites over the dinner table. ‘Mine’s George,’ she said, like nobody would have guessed from the badge she was wearing. ‘What’s yours?’

Though I owned a John Lennon string puppet, I was indifferent to The Beatles. Millie’s squeaky rendition of My Boy Lollipop had more appeal and I wasn’t alone in liking it. William ‘Bimbo’ Hollands liked it too and the pair of us were highly amused when Millie brought out a follow up called My Sweet William.

Miss Bayes, our form teacher, took us for most subjects in class 2/2, including Art and Craft, a lesson I loved. Making a Viking ship out of matchboxes didn’t seem possible till we joined four, end to end, and glued painted strips along the sides. Shields made a big difference and though fixing the sail was a bit tricky, the finished article was just reward our perseverance. Good old Miss Bayes!

William ‘Bimbo’ Hollands: "Miss Bayes said 2/2 percussion band is better than the Beatles!"

Miss Tapsell took us for music in the hall. Most of the time that meant her playing the piano while we stood in line, one song pamphlet between two, singing soppy songs like ‘Soldier Soldier Won’t you Marry Me?’ Just occasionally though, she wheeled out the instrument trolley… and did I ever get a drum? No. Tambourine? Once in a while. Castanet? Rarely. Triangle? Yes, almost every rotten time.

Mister Knowles taught us History in one of the huts. If Mister Knowles wasn’t the oldest man in the world, he certainly looked like it. Never had I seen so much wrinkled skin on one person, but I liked Mister Knowles, and I liked History and I enjoyed our main topic; the Romans, which then introduced us to Caractacus and Bodicea. Some of the boys joined his after school stamp club, Kevin Garlick, Paul Parker, William Hollands and myself included but for all our enthusiasm, stamp collecting fell way short of its promise. Like everyone else, I got an album and over a few weeks, collected stamps from places like Sverige and Helvetia. I also learned what ‘on approval’ meant when Dad stopped me sending off for the free stamps I’d seen advertised in a newspaper. Mostly though, my discouragement came from the countless hours I wasted looking for a penny black in the packs of stamps displayed in Arnold’s corner window.

Paul Parker: “I swapped my stamp collection for a Dalek annual, what an idiot.”