I was a swot at school. I think it was out of fear. On the level of my fear of spiders, not handing in homework was a nest of spiders at the bottom of my bed ready to spin nocturnal webs across my eyelids. So envision me sitting attentively in a chemistry lab at the age of fifteen where I learn from my less fearful fellow pupils that a new television channel is to begin broadcasting that very evening. The fact that I remember this remarkable event in televisual history at all is in itself remarkable. The family TV set was heavily controlled by my mother and the black and white portable one in my bedroom had an intermittent relationship with BBC2 alone.

Mum rarely watched ITV. It was commercial, so it was common. So a further choice of a side that ‘advertised’ was met with indifference and contempt. Thank God the BBC showed Dad’s Army, Porridge and M*A*S*H. Thank God Mum liked them. Not for us the weekly delights of traumatised soap Scousers that Channel 4 had in store for its fledgling viewers. Anything from Liverpool was common. Which is ironic because Mum was from Leeds and secretly loved Coronation Street.

So envision me sitting attentively in a chemistry lab at the age of fifteen where I learn from my less fearful fellow pupils that a new television channel is to begin broadcasting that very evening

When I was offered an odd little series called Black Books, Mum suppressed her channel snobbery and showered me with vague indifference – the perfect parental response to a swot’s rebellion. But Channel 4 had its revenge. Mum became an ardent BB devotee.