I vividly remember my very first exposure to the music of The Beatles: as a child of about 8 or 9 years of age, I was walking down Windsor Road, Ealing Broadway, West London when I heard a sound unlike anything else I'd ever heard before coming from the windows of a house on an intersecting street.

It took me a little while in the (pre-Internet) days of b/w TV and 45rpm vinyl singles to make a connection with that music and a peculiar, black amorphous object I discovered one day blowing over the playing-fields of St Gregory's Primary School- a phenomenon I later identified as a once-popular merchandising item: the black plastic Beatles wig.

It took me even longer to make the connection between the strangely alluring music heard on Windsor Road, the black plastic wig and the brooches next to the pick n mix sweetie counter in Woolworth's sporting the then incomprehensible legends 'John', 'Paul', 'George' and 'Ringo'.

Any other childhood memories of The Beatles before they became universally famous? As a young child, it took a while to put all the pieces together.

I always knew that some bloke from a band narrated THOMAS THE TANK, as my dad always pointed it out (probably hoping I would one day become a fan).

Sorry, nothing like the kind of experiences you were hoping people to share!

Two things struck me as a child about the phenomenon of "Beatlemania":

1. It was compulsory in the school playground to have an answer to the question, "Who's your favourite Beatle?". It was one of those tribal identifying signals: "Which football team do you support?" "Are you a Mod or a Rocker?" "Who's going to win, Henry Cooper or Cassius Clay (as Ali was known in those days)?"

This resulted in a childhood of frequently precarious bluffing because:

a) I didn't actually know the names of many football teams.
b) I had only the sketchiest notion of what a "Mod" and a "Rocker" actually were.
c) I had no idea that people punched one another for a living.
d) I could scarcely distinguish one Beatle from another.

2. Because I knew nothing at all about Sex at that age, I was bewildered and not a little disgusted by the b/w newsreel footage of girls screaming at airports. It completely baffled me.

It was all rather like that moment at Saturday Morning Pictures when the screen kiss happened in the middle of a western: universal jeers from all the boys in the audience at this soppy and incomprehensible girly stuff.

My first memory of anything Beatle related was age 7, going to see the school production put on by the 8-11 year olds in my school showing 1000 years of British history, marking the millenium in 2000. My sister was Thomas à Becket. Anyway, the year 6s did the Beatles and they ran on in suits, wigs and masks and mimed their way through a couple songs, with the rest of the cast dancing around and cheering. I don't really remember much, but I'm pretty sure that was my first exposure. Actually no, before that at age 5 we watched a video all about the letter Y and they played 'Yellow Submarine' and we all thought it was a way cool song.

Nothing really exciting there, only 3/4 of the band were even alive at this point. I remember when George Harrison died, I watched it on newsround and I cant say it interested me much.

Each successive generation of schoolkids is going to have its own playground tests of tribal identity, LaRue.

You're probably closer to this exchange from the Father Ted episode "The Old Grey Whistle Theft" in which the child-like Dougal is interrogated by his new mate, a young priest of dubious character:

MATE: Who do you like best, Blur or Oasis?
DOUGAL: (hesitates, then) Blur.
MATE: (complete disgust) WHHATT???
DOUGAL (rapid retraction). Oasis...I meant Oasis.

Yes, though even that was slightly before my time, more a Twood thing. I'm trying to think what we were divided on.... probably Busted v. McFly.... Britney v. Christina.... there wasn't really anything too iconic going on 6 or 7 years ago.

God Almighty! I'm really VERY old.

Oldmanemu is going to have to look to his laurels as the resident sage of ATU.

Congratulations, you've just earned a genuine LOL.



Shit, muthafuckin neighbor's cat is trying to start shit wit my kittay again. .. .

Re: Mods and Rockers. English working-class youth culture is always producing these kind of clannish and often violent antagonisms. It's in the blood. A kind of Rite of Passage. Most people grow out of them. Nothing sadder than an aging "Teddy Boy".

ROCKERS (or "Greasers"): rode high-powered motorcycles, wore studded leather jackets and jeans, greased their hair, got pissed, listened to first-generation rock n roll. Blokes, oddly, often danced with other blokes.

MODS: rode customised Vespa scooters, wore smart suits, had modish hair-styles, took pills, listened to 60's "Modernist" bands such as The Who. "Stylishness despite economic adversity" is not a bad definition.

As Ringo said, I'm a mocker.

I still dont know if I would have been a Mod or a Rocker (if forced). Teddyboys look like tossers, so I guess that would work against them.

This magazine, which showed that all 4 were in urgent need of a barber.



Also, a newspaper story suggesting that Paul had a girl in his hotel room after visiting hours.
The newspaper hastened to add that the moral conduct of the other 3 Beatles has been above reproach, as far as was known.

My grandmother thought the Beatles were funny looking, and when "I Want to Hold your Hand" became a hit, she wrote a parody (with different music) called "I like to Tweak Your Pretty Ear."