James Farrell

My father used to say that I was the "jackpot".

He then stopped sleeping with my mother, not because he did not love her, but in Ireland in the 1950's there was no contraception. He had got the long awaited son so why bother he thought.

Well, I grew up in 1950's Ireland and it was a funny life- but in a peculiar way.

Choir boy, altar boy and head boy of the children's sodality - I revelled in the pre-Vatican 2 catholic rituals.

Come to think of it, I wanted to be a saint- preferably a martyred one - a bit like a male version of St Joan.

Then at 14 years of age I discovered David Bowie and my life changed irrevocably.

Gone went the "bells and smells" and in came Ziggy O' Stardust.

As I say my childhood was funny.