A casual but erudite browser of the many and varied threads of the rich fabric that makes up this website will quickly glean three things:

1) A lot of no-longer-in-their-first-flush blokes have too much time on their hands
2) Either ladies don't like music, or have more sense than to spend their time in the endless debate
3) There are quite a few current or former local newspaper reporters rooting in this vast dustbin of trivia and quirk - and I mean that affectionately, given that I am of such pedigree.

So, given the experience and longevity of the Word readerhood, and the inky past of quite a few of us, some of you must have crossed paths at an early stage with people whose talents went on to blossom and spread beauty on the world.

In the ‘80s I used to write two music columns for a weekly newspaper series serving the Midlands city of Lichfield. And that meant spending many a happy night in pubs, rubbing shoulders with and enjoying the music of local bands striving for the big time, or just plain enjoying themselves. Ubik, Big Daisy, RPM, the Sucks, Sticky Fingers and others came, impressed and went. Others were just plain painful.

But one or two spawned real talent:

- Anthea & the Organelles featured Bill Pritchard, currently - I think - a cult recording artist in France who contributed to Leonard Cohen tribute LP I'm Your Fan.
- Victorian Parents were played by Peel and actually recorded for Polydor before dissolving soon after a catastrophic appearance in front of a live audience on TOGWT.
- Red Cassette were a great little good-time band whose lead singer was one Nic Harcourt, currently music director of Word favourite radio station KRCW, host of Morning Becomes Eclectic and respected taste-maker. Good to know him then, and I'm delighted he is where he is today, though having been in touch with him, he took a hard road to get there after leaving the Midlands behind.

Oh, and on a more tenuous note, I shared a Latin teacher (not in the Biblical sense) with one Bryan Ferry, who had passed through Washington Grammar School before I arrived. Miss (Dot) Lawson's opinion of the be-quiffed one after his debut appearance on TOTP - "Well, I didn't think Bryan Ferry was THAT sort of a boy!"

So, my own brushes with the nascent great and good have been minor. How about impressing/entertaining us with your own experiences?