50 years as a Coronation Street fan

Hello, it's me. I'm Glenda the Coronation Street Blog editor, aka Flaming Nora. I'm not here today, you're reading this while I'm away on holiday. Today I'm celebrating my 50th birthday. It's a big one and no mistake, as the actress might have said to the Bishop.  

Celebrating a milestone birthday makes me realise that for most of my 50 years, I've been a Coronation Street fan. Mostly I've enjoyed it but sometimes I haven't. I stopped watching it once for a few weeks during one summer a few years ago, so bad was the dialogue and storyline, I felt. Watching Corrie is a lot like supporting a football club. You take the season as it comes, hoping that the new manager can knock the team into shape.There's always the hope it'll work out alright.

I grew up with Coronation Street. I remember sitting and watching it on TV, huddled on the sofa with my grandma, the two of us laughing at Elsie Tanner's antics with men, pretending to be shocked at the harlot of the Street. My mam would sit in the chair on the other side of the living room, knitting, tutting at both Elsie on the telly, and at me and grandma laughing at Elsie. Mam thought Elsie Tanner was a bad kind, the wrong kind of woman. Me and grandma thought she was ace. I thought Elsie was one of the most glamorous women I'd ever seen in my young life. And the women on the show talked just like the women I grew up with in working-class north-east England. Different accents maybe, but the content of their conversations were the same.

Growing up, I still watched Corrie and tuned in regularly, it was always there, always part of life. Another strong memory is watching Hilda Ogden's leaving episode on a Christmas Eve  night. I watched it with my younger brother and the two of us had tears in our eyes as Hilda sang 'Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye' 

When I found the internet back in 1993 the first two words I typed into what then passed for a search engine were Coronation Street.  The only thing online back then was the usenet group ratucs - rec.arts.tv.uk.coronation-st. I fell in love with the group, talked to fans not only in the UK but overseas too about our favourite show. We swapped tales, spoilers, some of us typed up whole interviews from papers and magazines to share with other fans. We made our own Corrie fan websites.

And that's how it started. I've been online ever since, writing Coronation Street weekly updates since 1995.  I'm still loving Corrie and am writing about it both here on the Coronation Street Blog and now as owner of the internet's first and original Corrie website Corrie.net. I couldn't do either the blog or corrie.net without the help and support of the blogging team here and Diane Johnston  in Canada.  I've also had a book published about Roy and Hayley Cropper, as well as carrying out other "official" Corrie work for ITV - read all about it here. 

Maxine's bench - has a lot to answer for!

I've met some wonderful people through Coronation Street fan forums online and it's fair to say that Coronation Street has changed my life - and for the better too.

Happy Birthday to me. And here's to another 50 years of being a Corrie fan!

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