I heard a song on Idols the other day and just had to have it. So I memorized a couple of lines of the chorus and when I got to my computer I googled them. Well of course up popped the song straight away - In a flash I went to iTunes and downloaded the song for a couple of dollars!!

The love of music did not come so easily when I was a teenager. No instant gratification then.! If we heard a song on ZBC that we liked we had to just wait till we heard it again, or we had to go down to Spinalong at Haddon and Sly and buy the seven single!! That of course was way out of our budget as we baby boomers were all penniless in those days!!

Of course one could pretend one was a bona fide paying customer and go and listen to the song on the earphones at Spinalong, but actually buying the Seven Single was unheard of !!

And so it was, we had to wait until Lyons Maid Hits of the Week on Saturday morning to hear the song again!! Or maybe if we were lucky we might hear it on LM Radio!! The hunger was great in those halcyon teenage days, but it was worth the wait....

These days, we do not know the meaning of the word 'wait' if we want it, we get it, we are so very privileged. But that hunger was good for one I am sure. Really craving and wanting something, and not being automatically given it, was very character building (or so Mother used to say!!)

If we went to a party, which was not very often, people did not throw parties too often in case off 'gatecrashers'! We would all take our own seven singles, or the few we had managed to buy with our meager pocket money. Carefully labelled, they were few and far between so they would be played to death on the old turntables.

With the advent of the L.P. (long playing record), money was a little more plentiful then!! We of course had a Beatles LP, and maybe a Bee Gees if we were really lucky!! We were even lucky enough to go and see Cliff Richard LIVE at the Palace Theatre. Now that was lifetime treat and Mom probably had to save a considerable sum of money, and do without herself, to treat Gavin and I to something like that!! My gosh those lucky few of us who went were so envied by those whose folks could not afford it!! Oh my goodness, I was so in love with Cliff Richard and Mum even bought us the single 'Summer Holiday' at month end, (on t flip side of the single was 'Living Doll'!

Mom only ever had two song collections - she had the 'Annie Get Your Gun' series of seven singles, and the stage show 'Oklahoma'. Gavin and I would play them to death, I could sing every word for you right now if asked.

She also had a lone seven single of 'Oh Mein Papa' which she bought with her Christmas Bonus when her Dad died...

Today my iPhone is crammed full of the songs I like, but I still remember clearly how we would live for Saturdays at ten o'clock to listen to Lyons Maid Hits of the Week with Martin Lock and Mike Westcott!