SO, I got a bit caught the other day and had to take Geraldine to that big store with a blue logo.

This unhappy event coincided with me having a sudden realisation that, at the end of March, I passed my driving test 50 years ago. How did that happen?

I well remember getting the big green paper licence which was valid till 2027. My goodness, how far into the future was that - would people still have cars or would we have little space vehicles like the Jetsons?

I remember the test clearly, it was a Friday and my mate at school had been the first to take his, on the preceding Monday. He passed - so no pressure, then. Luckily, despite a slight mishap reversing round the corner, I did pass and this had a big impact on both my dad and I.

Basically, as I was keen to drive anywhere, I now had the joys of taking my mum shopping on a Thursday night.

This was before big supermarkets but there was one in town that was an initial first attempt, a bit like a big Spar.

This came back to me standing in the supermarket as I watched the man scanning our (numerous) items. At the smaller establishment, 50 years ago, the tills were manually operated by women (never saw a man) and their finger action on the buttons was unbelievable - I would say as fast as scanning. What a skill it was, now long gone, and how times have changed.

Credit cards, plastic bags and sell-by dates were all far in the future.

Despite this fascinating element of doing the shop run, it soon paled into insignificance until, a year later, my brother passed his test and the baton was duly passed on.