On moving house to Penydarren my new close friends were: Geoffrey Palmer, my next door neighbour; Vivian Jones, Geoff's cousin who later became Dunlop and lived 3 doors up, and Robert Lloyd down the bottom of the street at No. 8. Later Gareth Davies and David Saunders neighbours of Robert joined in, there was also Gerald Williams. Robert's father, a railway worker, was fortunate to have a patch at the Royal Crescent allotments where he would grow vegetables and strawberries, the waiting list was counted in decades. Most of my playing was in Trevethick St. where I spent a lot of time with my gran as a second home where I could do what I liked; my aunty Cassie's home down the road was different, I felt free to open the door without knocking but once inside I would sit on the farthest chair from the fire by the door waiting for cousin Denise, I love Denise, she is important in my life and there was only a school year between us, but I can't help thinking that if my gran hadn't been living 4 doors up I wouldn't have got to know her any better than any other of my cousins from my father's side of the family, When I wasn't in the street playing I'd have my meals with my gran, she baked a great rice pudding, and she would slice potatoes flat to fry in the pan instead of doing chips the way I was used to, and I felt posh eating strawberries & cream like during Wimbledon fortnight except that they were from a tin can. I used to go back there from sunday school and one time when small I remember joyfully walking quickly down the street because my birthday was on a sunday and I shared it with Jesus Christ. I used to read passages from the bible and psalms with my gran listening near the coal fire in the chimney. Gran used to have a harmonium with plugs and pedals that I played on, play as in plaything, I could never read a note and am as near to being tone deaf as it's possible to be, we had a piano at home and my brother took lessons, I suppose my father didn't see the point in wasting money on what he considered a futile exercise, in junior school an itinerant teacher came around seeking potential pupils for the violin, he gave me a voice test leading to my not being chosen. My cousin Sylvia used to listen to Emperor Roscoe on Radio Luxembourg in the front room, the forerunner of pirate radio and Radio One, but the sound was infamous for its inconsistencies; also in the front room was a gramaphone constructed by my father, it had a handwinder & pins and this is where I heard Elvis Presley for the first time singing Hound Dog & Heartbreak Hotel. Years later gran eventually bought a tv , on a saturday night my mother would take her down the pub for a few drinks leaving me alone in front of the screen to watch Welsh language programmes such as 'Hob y Deri Dando' & 'Disc a Dawn'. I'd watch Mary Hopkin singing in Welsh years before she became famous from her appearences on 'Opportunity Knocks' winning week after week, this would have been impossible at home.
My brother who had regained his name Maldwyn by this time, as I've stated, was a pupil in Abermorlais Juniors, or Primary School, and that is where most of my friends went after Queens Rd, except for the ones who went to Twynyrodyn, and Paul Jenkins, Valerie Brace, if she was in Queens Rd.; Lilian Richards; Carole Anne Harris & myself who went to Penydarren. Abermorlais was known to have a higher success rate than Penydarren at 11 plus, with even the Bs passing, in Penydarren not all the As passed, nobody in the Bs. For some reason we all went into the Bs, with Paul early on being transferred to the A stream. I learnt to write properly, the multiplication tables to 12 x 12, the months of the year in Welsh, we had our own little library which contained Beatrix Potter's Brer Rabbit stories, and were regularly given reading tests which were their guide to our abilities more so than mental arithmetic. I was put on the top table and before the end of the year Carole and myself were transferred to the As ready to start 2A with our new friends. In our first year we'd had various teachers, I mainly remember a Mrs Raspbridge who taught me a lot, otherwise it was noticeable that outside the A stream there wasn't a high standard of teaching because the children weren't expected to go far in life and the teachers and the headmaster were mainly Labour Party hacks. We were very fortunate that in years two & three we had two of the best in Anita James & Kenneth Adams Morgan, neither of whom were members of the Labour Party, they must have been good because they were both given headships relatively young, when normally 'members' were the first to be moved on.
I remember Mr. Morgan in standard 3 setting us a composition, it didn't become 'essay' until grammar school, on our home life and how we ate; at home we had a varied menu that changed every day from a stocked up cupboard and fridge. There was a Heinz company who supplied us with much of our food although we didn't go to the whole 57 varieties, every day was different, we had : ham & chips; egg & chips; sausage & chips; beans & chips; spaghetti & chips (inconceivable to the Bretons); fish fingers & chips; as I got older I was allowed the luxury of sausage, egg, beans & chips; pie & chips & fish & chips we could get at the local fish shop; sundays we had boiled potatoes, meat, veg & gravy; later on we had steak with onion gravy on tuesday nights. I asked a neighbour what breed his dog was, to which he replied "it's a Heinz dog", I said "what's that?, he replied "57 varieties", ouch.
There was Lynwen Rhydderch , our resident 'Welsh' teacher who taught us songs in the Welsh Language and got us to sign up to membership of 'Urdd Gobaith Cymru', the Welsh League of Youth, not surprising perhaps having a name like that she should be so taken with the culture; one day she invited me on a coach trip to the Urdd camp in Llangrannog on the Cardiganshire coast, when I asked my mother permission she refused, leading to a ticking off on the monday because waiting for me made them late starting off; however, she wasn't the person giving us our regular Welsh lessons, it was an elderly lady from Penydarren and I hated every second of it, I have always reacted more to the teacher than the subject. I always remember Kerry Lloyd standing in front of the class tightening his neck muscles when she asked him to repeat the Welsh he'd learnt.
One day Miss James was asking us about our christmas presents and as I didn't get any I was hoping that I wouldn't be asked; my mother used to say that because I got them all year round I didn't need them at Christmas. I got my toy soldiers from a corn flakes packet & photos from PG Tips, not toys, but they filled the role, my father worked in a toy factory, so I remember a toy fort, a crane, a dumper truck, a car transporter lorry and a lorry big enough to ride on, I missed out on a toy racing car when the other children were racing them on the street and in the school yard, and roller skates when they were in fashion, but joined in when marbles or harlies were very popular, same with dickstones, and I don't want to be too unfair because as I got older my brother & I shared a scalextric track, until he walked on part of it, a horse racing game where the horses advanced through vibration when turning a handle, an electric train set; I know this is nit-picking, I would have liked a steam train but got a modern american locomotive instead; and I had a small to medium snooker table. My parents didn't discuss their family matters so they never knew what was popular with other children at any given time, they basically kept themselves to themselves, we never had visitors to the house, although my father had his saturday afternoon for placing his bets & a drink, and there was always an evening put aside for the two of them to go out; firstly I remember The Harp on the Swansea Road, then it was The Nelson on Pontmorlais where my father was in the darts team and as a self taught piano player he would guide the ambiance after the match on the honky-tonk and my mother would help prepare sandwiches for the away side, then it was Merthyr Labour Club and finally the Penydarrren Club. For a while I made a point of getting up early to go to school and help one of the cleaners go around the classes polishing the desks, apparently it wasn't the first time for a pupil to do this but it was usually a girl; I didn't get up early enough for a popular childrens' saturday morning show because my mother preferred to keep me in bed out of the way and out of mischief as she saw it.
