Well, I grew up in the north and we were very poor. As a baby, so I'm told, I was put in a drawer to sleep because my parents couldn't afford a cot. I had three brothers and two sisters, all of them younger than me, so I didn't get much of an education, although I enjoyed school and would have liked to have stayed on longer. Still, with five other children younger than me, my parents couldn't afford it, so I went to work at the local textile mill at the age of 14. It was hard work, but the lads and lasses were good company and I made some friends there. Of course we had few luxuries – no toys to speak of, hand–me–down clothing for my brothers and sisters – I was relatively lucky, being the firstborn, as my clothes were sometimes new, although even I had to wear some things from my cousins. The only thing my mother insisted we had new was shoes – they used to cost the poor woman a fortune – and underwear, of course. We never starved or anything, but it was nothing like what the kids get today. My youngest grandson is a case in point ... he insists on the most expensive shoes for sports – trainers, I think they call them – and now he wants a new computer...