My Lancashire Childhood

Enter your postcode below to personalise your weather feed. A string of top awards and a Royal Variety Show appearance cemented his place among the stars. He spoke to David Ridings about his life and times. That is to say a very warm, welcoming and enthusiastic crowd who have come out just to see me and have a laugh. My comedy is largely observational - comedy of the everyday which by definition applies to all areas of the country.

Having said that, I used to include a routine about Wigan which could have alienated some folk from the south coast who were unaware of the pie culture! I think that it is a major part of the psyche of comedians to continually observe and absorb events that surround them.

In my opinion, those people do us a great disservice by not recognising the considerable skill and craft involved in converting something so seemingly mundane and everyday into laugh out loud funny. Can comedians can have so much exposure on television they are no longer funny? There is some truth in the old adage: I might add that by contrast there are many excellent comedians on the circuit who rarely get the chance. A lot is decided by the agency they are signed up to. If a comedian is with a smaller agent or freelance as I am the opportunities are severely limited which is unhealthy and dispiriting.

One that revolves around the world of ballroom dancing would be a winner. I think that there would still be the same competitive elements and snobbery, elitism and personality clashes between the couples attending. Only perform material that you think is funny; so funny that when you wrote it, it made you smile or laugh yourself. Make them like you. Growing up in the rows of terraced houses round the mills on Chorley Old Road. Two up, two down houses with an outside loo which had a paraffin lamp to stop the cistern freezing and newspaper on a nail.

Coal fires but no firelighters, my mum Donkey stoning steps - she got that off the rag and bone man.

The mills were our adventure playground and we played football and cricket on the cobbled streets. I drove past recently and the painted-on wickets are still on the mill wall. We had different rules — one handed catches off the wall allowed and a peg-leg in any kind of dispute. We were delighted to meet again and, naturally, I called him Jerry. Children were only allowed two and a half ounces of sweets or chocolate per week. Also, my uncle — who was in the Army — used to save up all his chocolate ration for me. No wonder I like chocolate! To help keep us nourished we were sometimes given a brown paper bag at school, containing a mixture of cocoa powder and sugar.

We used to eat some of it going home from school, using a wet finger. We could also buy liquorice at a local shop.

When sucked and chewed it went all stringy. You rarely see it nowadays. They were a great treat, but I also liked bread soaked in reconstituted dried egg, then fried. We dug up half the garden and grew our own veg. Every month they would send us a food parcel and occasionally a clothes parcel. They were only allowed to send second-hand clothes, so they would buy new ones, wash them and then send them! The parcels had always been opened and the contents checked. In the food parcels there was always a tin of bacon: They also sent us butter: On top, in the middle, was an orange-coloured capsule.

We had to break the capsule by squeezing the unopened bag to release the colouring, then knead the bag until it was all mixed in and the butter was a nice pale yellow! The sweets they called candies, and tasted scented. There were tinned peaches which Mum saved for when we had visitors and rice — which I hated but Dad loved. As a builder Dad was in a reserved occupation and was sent to work on building aeroplanes at the Dick Kerr Works in Strand Road.

Being an outdoor man he hated it and as a means of escape for a short while, he would come home on his bicycle every lunchtime. Mum would cook Dad a hot meal, plate it and put in on the floor near a door. Saturday matinees always had the same format, a cartoon, a short, a main feature and a serial episode.

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We received 6d pocket money so we usually went in the 4d seats and spent the 2d on something to eat. They looked like caramel sweets wrapped in white paper but tasted more like candle tallow. Other times we called in at the health shop and bought dried bananas. Occasionally we would pool our money and buy a packet of Rowntrees cocoa then try to persuade mum to let us have some sugar to make a cocoa dip.

During the week the two local cinemas, the Regal and the old theatre converted to a cinema and called the Empire, had two main feature films each week. The first showed twice nightly on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. The second was twice nightly on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Whenever we could get the money we would go to the first house at least twice a week. Friday night, Dad went out Union collecting and we stayed in with mum. Of course, the news was always listened to by our parents and one news reader in particular became very popular. His name was Wilfred Pickles.

His accent somehow seemed to win through. This was quite unusual for the BBC to have some one at that time who spoke with a regional accent. Perhaps that was what made him popular. During the latter part of the war, the small bedroom was out of bounds leading up to Christmas.

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Dad spent many hours in the room but we had no idea what he was doing until Christmas morning. In the living room were two bicycles, one for Colin and one for me. Eventually a solution was found; the peddles would be built up with blocks of wood. Uncle Dan, not a real uncle, a close friend of the family had been a keen cyclist prior to the war and had a hut full of bicycle parts. He had given dad enough parts to make up the two cycles. Dad had managed to get some paint from somewhere, probably work, and hand painted them.

Very few of my friends had a bike of their own, new or otherwise. One Saturday, mum, dad and we three boys had taken a trip to Burnley to do some shopping. As we passed by the Burnley Vic Theatre, who should be the star attraction, none other than the famous news reader, Wilfred Pickles. Mum suggested to dad that we go to the matinee performance. Dad left us to see if there were any spare seats. He returned with tickets for seats in the gods. To gain access to those dizzy heights meant we had to enter the theatre around the back and climb, what seemed to be an eternal stairway.

This balcony, being the third level was high up that the backs of the seats in front of us were almost at floor level. Had I swung my legs I might have kicked the person in front in the back of the head. The show had a variety of performers only two of which I can now remember. I recall a rather strange sensation at the thought of seeing someone for the first time who I had known as a bodiless voice on the radio. The interval came and went and the next performance began. I thought it might have something to do with the fact that much of what was going on seemed to be out of view since being so high up we were prevented from seeing the upper part of some ladies standing or sitting on white columns.

The scene kept changing and an announcer was describing each performance as a works of art. Colin and I kept bending down to try to see what was going on, which only made mum more angry with dad and both tried to prevent us bending down saying we would fall. The whole scene was positively boring. Along with mum, we were glad when the whole performance was over. Several years later I discovered what the fuss was all about. Having moved to Bacup, dad transferred to the Bacup branch of the Home Guard.

Eventually they were fully kitted out with uniform and guns. I recall one day a big event taking place between the Home Guard and a regiment of regular soldiers on Bacup Rec. In a field near by the public were invited to witness a mock battle and afterwards view various guns and vehicles. The whole event ended in a march past in the centre of town.

I recall marching along the pavement at the side of my dad until a policeman returned me to my mother. One day, at school, we were told the Americans had sent over food parcels for each family. No one knew it could be made into a drink. I recall our first bonfire when war was over. Our gang set out to gather wood for the big celebration. The trouble was, none of us could ever remember going to a bonfire before in our lives. We had had several camp fires and understood a bonfire was bigger but we had no idea of how big. Our first attempt was far from the ideal. The trunk of the tree burnt for several days.

Author releases stories from post-war Burnley childhood | Lancashire Telegraph

King George VI sent a message to every child in the country. It was embossed with gold and other coloured lettering. We hung mine on the bedroom wall. It stayed there for a long time and unfortunately disappeared, possibly when we eventually moved back to Britannia after the war. The War Years were very hard for many people, especially those who lost loved ones, had their homes and possessions destroyed, saw their businesses crumble due to shortages and those who experienced none of those but had sons or husbands away fighting and had to suffer the uncertainty as to whether they would ever see them again.

My war was free from any of those extremely distressing experiences. I only suffered a stone hitting me on the head during one of our gang wars and Freda Smith, in here nurses outfit, wanting to nurse me back to health.

Author releases stories from post-war Burnley childhood

I suppose I was almost an outside observer, occasionally looking in. Find out how you can use this. Most of the content on this site is created by our users, who are members of the public. The views expressed are theirs and unless specifically stated are not those of the BBC. The BBC is not responsible for the content of any external sites referenced. In the event that you consider anything on this page to be in breach of the site's House Rules , please click here.

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