I was around four years old, and my house backed on to the school that I had started attending just a few days before. Life was great; I was spending long periods with my friends with new toys and we had different people to tell us stories. Until then I was only able to play with my friends when my mum went to see their mums, and I just got stories when I went to bed There were new kids to make friends with as well !Where had they all been hiding?

Even though my house was adjacent to the school my mum decided it would be a good idea for me to stay in school during lunchtimes and have lunch with my friends, old and new. It was only a small school so I actually got to see some of my older friends during the lunch times. We had lunch in a communal area which also doubled as a church, where we sang hymns and things, and a gymnasium, where we jumped and climbed things I had simply never seen before.

Mum was a superb cook and I loved whatever she produced for breakfast, lunch or dinner. In fact in my short life we had found I only disliked two things – rice pudding and porridge. So, whilst dad loved these, I was always offered an attractive alternative from my “I like this” list. What I had been offered in school was not in mum’s league but was edible and eagerly awaited by a growing boy who had, after all, not eaten for four hours.

So life was great – well at least for three days it was anyway. It all went pear-shaped on the fourth day.

The day had started like all others, breakfast, short stroll to school, stories and painting, then lunchtime when we were marched, like junior prisoners of war, from our own room, through three others and, into the hall which today was serving as the canteen. We sat on little tables and chairs – you know the ones that parents try and sit on when they come for Parent’s Evenings. Well then I seemed to fit in them properly. I was surrounded by my class mates and could easily see and chat to some of my older friends. The dinner ladies appeared, like some sort of magicians, and placed sausage and mash on plates in front of each of us. Wow- my favourite!