I remember his mum and dad with their shoe shop in Chester market. There wasn't a day go by without Mr Rahman popping in to Michael's Materials where I sat sewing (yes, me."sat") to see what I was making.
Husb taught him at Kingsway High School so we knew he had always been fascinated by TV, in particular the Eurovision Song Contest. It was no surprise he spent several years working on Granada TV with Lucy Meacock. He was very watchable and we would talk back to him on tele so we were all a bit sad when he left for a new job with Al Jazeera TV but he comes home to Chester regularly.
The reason So did his talk at Chester Museum was to raise funds and awareness for Alzheimers Disease about which he spoke so honestly and meaningfully, having been the sole carer for his lovely Dad who suffered from the disease.
OF COURSE he remembered me!
He said "Hi Ali, where's Mike?"
He hadn't changed a bit,
Meanwhile Husb was reunioning (?) with the Brookvale lot (WOOP) and with Jimmy from 90's pop group 911.
Jimmy was an ex pupil at Brookvale and he was MADE UP to see Mr H.
It sounded like a great night. There was no sign of John Bishop though.
Hazel O'Connor however didn't remember me, but then..she only went to Wyken Croft JUNIOR school like me. She didn't go to Stoke Park Senior School even though I had told everyone she DID oops.
She did a Meet and Greet at Telfords Warehouse so Cheryl got tickets for Dale and I and she was absolutely fantastic.
Still belting out songs at 60 and told us stories of her life that made the 3 of us say "Maybe we will buy her autobiography."
I ran away from my home in Coventry when I was 16.....made and sold clothes in Amsterdam, picked grapes in France, joined a dance troupe that went to Tokyo then onto Beirut (escaping the start of the civil war by one month!) traveled West Africa, crossed the Sahara, sang with a dreadful singing trio for the U.S. troops in Germany and came home to "settle down". Through all this experience of life and the world I realized that singing always cheered me up. I decided to be a singer. Through strange turns of fate I ended up in a film called 'Breaking Glass' I also ended up writing all the songs for the movie.
We really weren't sure what to expect.
But whatever we expected, she exceeded it by miles.
She was so nice, so honest, so kind, so lovely and sang so well.
She was touring with Clare Hirst (Communards, David Bowie) who was SUPERB on the saxophone and Sarah Fisher (Eurythmics) who was SUPERB on keyboard.
The blend of their three voices with the playing skills of Clare and Sarah was magical. She had Telfords up on their feet and had a queue out the door for photos.
Honestly, I can't tell you how much I enjoyed the show.
If she is coming near you...
GO SEE HER :)
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