Mum made the right choice when she decided to leave her part-time job and start writing full-time in the summer of 1979. Her short stories were in demand and there were plenty of magazines for women and teenage girls that she could sell them to in the UK and Europe.
She also discovered a talent for writing scripts for photo-stories which were very popular in teenage magazines at the time and even wrote a few photo-novels for Blue Jeans magazine.
It was completely different from anything Mum had ever done before. In fact, it was more like writing a play than a story, but it paid well and she enjoyed doing it.
As before, editors invited her to morning coffee, lunch or afternoon tea at which they would discuss what was going in the magazine world and what she could write next for them.
She also continued travelling, though not as extensively as she’d done in the past because she was too busy writing to go away for more than a couple of days at a time. Instead she decided to try and go to some of the events in the UK that she’d only ever seen on television.
The first of these was the Horse of the Year Show at Olympia in London.
This involved a two-night stay in the capital, which not only gave her chance to meet up with one of her editors for lunch, but also enabled her to go see the musical “The King and I” with Yul Brynner and Virginia McKenna on stage at the London Palladium.
Not long after that, her novel The Bradleys of Brookroyd arrived in the shops. Unlike with Cloughfold and The Romany, however, there seemed to be very little fuss. There were no local radio or television interviews and next to nothing on the local papers, apart from the two in her home town.
There was also no mention of any of the big deals that the publisher – and Mum! – had been hoping for, though Mum knew that these sometimes took a while to negotiate.
And she did get the second part of her advance in time for Christmas which meant that her wish for 1979 to end in a better way than it began at least came partly true!
Then as 1980 started, Mum began to think of other traditionally British events that she could visit that year, though the first of them turned into disaster through no fault of her own.
This was a coach trip to London from a social club in her own town. But it wasn’t just a trip to London – it was a trip to the Houses of Parliament where their recently-elected MP, Ken Woolmer, had arranged to take them on a guided tour.
They set off early in the morning and all seemed to be going well until they were nearing Toddington Services on the M1 and suddenly there was a loud bang from inside the coach engine. Suddenly, instead of travelling along at 70 mph/112 kph, they were crawling along the hard shoulder and just hoping they would reach the service area before the engine packed up completely.
The next four hours were spent waiting for the damage to be fixed and, by the time they got to London, it was just about time to turn round and come back – though the driver did give them a quick unscheduled tour of the most famous sights, as many of the people on the coach had never been to London before.
Mum’s next trip was a lot more successful, however, as this was to the Chelsea Flower Show in the grounds of the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, famous as the home of the Chelsea Pensioners.
(Fortunately this was in the days before she began to suffer from Hay Fever, otherwise I think one of her sneezes might have blown the huge marquee down.)
While she was admiring the fabulous flower displays, however, she got talking to a middle-aged man who came out with the very worst chat-up line Mum has ever heard. After they’d chatted for a few minutes, he suddenly told Mum she had a beautiful smile.
For a moment she was flattered. Then he told her she had lovely teeth – and spoilt it by asking if they were her own!!
The next big event that Mum went to was Ladies’ Day at Royal Ascot. She wore a posh dress and a big hat and, though she doesn’t know much about horse-racing, she had a great day out.
She saw the Queen and other members of the Royal Family drive past in their open-topped carriages…
…and also saw Larry Hagman, then at the height of his fame as J.R Ewing in the television series Dallas, whose third season had just ended with him being shot by an unknown person.
She also watched all the races and was amazed at how the ground shook as the horses galloped by. Then, as the last race finished, it was time to find the right coach among the hundreds that were parked up and make the journey back to Yorkshire.
Mum’s next two trips were special treats for her parents, but she says I’ve written enough for today, so I’ll tell you about them in my next post. Meanwhile, please take care and stay safe and I’ll talk to you again soon!
Follow my next blog: 116. MY MUM THE STORY- TELLER- PART FIFTEEN
19/11/2020
Wilf the bear-faced blogger 