Over the next eight months there were many clandestine meetings. At the weekends I would return home to Rostrevor. A trip to Newry on a Saturday afternoon was spent in Foster’s coffee lounge. Fosters was a family department store with a lovely restaurant. Russian tea was very much in fashion. It was basically black tea served with lemon but we thought at seventeen we were very sophisticated and so Russian tea became the drink to be seen with. They also served the most delicious lemon meringue pie. Many happy hours were spent there, planning 
for the future. Saturday evenings were spent at the local cinema, the Aurora. The owner, George Tinnelly, was an old romantic and knowing our story allowed me to hide in the shop in the foyer until Gordon arrived, just in case my dad was on the prowl. He became a facilitator for our Saturday nights over the next few years.
Life was difficult at the weekends. There was constant scrutiny as to where I was going and who I was going with and I had to plan my meetings with Gordon with military precision. Back in Belfast in 1966 there were few means of corresponding. The hostel had a phone but it was always in use. Phone boxes were not always 
available or had large queues of people waiting to make a call. Writing was the other means of correspondence. So we started writing to each other. I still have those letters. Reading back on them now I see how immature we were during that first year. However I still read them from time to time and they bring back such happy memories.
Over the next eight months before Gordon moved to Belfast we managed to see each other at least once during the week. During the week Gordon would borrow his dad’s car to go and play badminton. Now I know this is not legal but he learned how to put the mileage clock on the car back and he then headed for Belfast. His dad thought he was playing badminton locally. I couldn’t wait until the next morning to check the news and be reassured that there were no accidents the previous night. On one occasion he met a car coming towards him on the wrong side of the motorway. Scary times. I was earning the princely sum of £29 per month so I supplied the ten shillings for the petrol. Many a night was spent at Shaw’s Bridge sitting in his dad’s Wolsey Hornet. Other nights we went to concerts or the ‘hops’ at the students union. On one occasion he took a mutual friend from Newry with him. We went to see Cream at the students union. The concert ran late and her mother became concerned. She rang my mother and explained that her daughter had gone to a concert with Gordon and Ann in Belfast. Merry hell broke out.
Apparently there were phone calls to the hostel but as it was after midnight no one answered. But come the morning I got a right earful and more pressure to break up with Gordon.There were many incidences like that but we were a real couple now and no one was going to break us up.
I was working in Dundonald House at that time. I had arrived straight from school and was totally bewildered with the officialdom present in the Northern Ireland Civil Service. It was quite stifling. Many employees were ex army officials and ran their sections like a regiment. My Head of Section came in to work in uniform one day a week ( she belonged to some section of the Territorial army ) but it was off-putting in a work environment. I was also told that she had prided herself in having an all Protestant section until I arrived and upset the apple cart. Such was the ethos in NI in the late sixties. Sexual harassment was also a big problem but there were no laws in those days and most of us had to put up with it. On many occasions I had to fight off older men in positions of power who thought it ok to chase you round the office and in some cases pin you down on your desk. Inappropriate comments were common place. I remember one particular gentlemen ( I use the term gentleman loosely) who I dreaded. He took a shine to me and would send for me to come to his office. He was badly injured in the war and was disfigured. He would leer over the desk and ask me for a kiss. Thankfully he couldn’t move very quickly and so it was possible to move out of his way when he lunged at me. But it was not a pleasant situation and complaining to higher ups was greeted with ‘There’s life in the old boy yet’. Sexual harassment was not treated with any seriousness in the 60’s or 70’s.
I grew up quickly back in those days. I began to get restless living in a hostel. Myself and a few friends I had made started looking around for a flat. We reckoned that there would be a good social life in the University area and so we moved to Cromwell Road. Not long after our move we got to go to our first formal as a couple. One of my flat mates attended the Art College and Gordon and I accompanied her to the annual formal. My dress was a beautiful green sateen with the price tag of £6 and I loved it. I think I got a few more formals out of it. Oh to be that weight again! Looking at the photo now we look like twelve year olds! 
When Gordon moved up to Belfast in July of 67 and he found a flat nearby we had no choice but to become adults living in the real world. Budgeting, cooking and cleaning. But we were still only 18 and despite all the opposition to our romance we had some good times before the troubles started.
*If you have been a victim of sexual harassment and need confidential advice please click here
This brings us to product releasing. Companies will build hype up to their next major release, whether it be a game, a computer or a phone. They will try and make people as excited as possible about the product . Adults with spare time on their hands, and with persuasion from their children, might even camp outside stores to get their hands on the product before it sells out. Advertising is huge in modern society. It is practically impossible to escape from it. Television, mobile phones, the internet and the newspapers are common places for ads to be found. Typically teenagers use these devices phones, more than the average adult or child, making them more vulnerable to its message. Teenagers are more susceptible to it, but cannot afford the products. If the consumer has no money to buy the item and no purchase has made, the advertisers attempt at selling the product has essentially failed.
In TV advertisements humour or repetition can be used to make the ad more memorable. This is especially effective with teenagers as they are more receptive. They are generally more easily entertained and if the advert is very entertaining they can make it an inside joke in their friendship group. Making the advert memorable it becomes iconic and so makes it more likely that they will want to buy it.
idolise celebrities and see them as role models because they are cool. Most want to aspire to be rich, famous, and talented. Some celebrities are just famous for being famous. Celebreties such as Paris Hilton or the Kardashians, yet, people still idolise them.
Flavoured lipstick was also en vogue, caramel, peppermint and strawberry. We must have looked like two prats as we paraded along the streets of Ballycastle but we thought we were gorgeous and it wasn’t long before we attracted attention from a couple of local youths. As my parents did not approve of boyfriends there was a lot of skullduggery and subterfuge going on so that we could meet our new beaus. Luckily there was a carnival that summer and a large tent was set up for dancing in the evening. We were permitted to go but had to be home by 10 p.m. Sonny and Cher were in the hit parade with “ I Got You Babe” and I have bitter-sweet memories of the song.
As I entered the sixties life was changing. I was still too young to appreciate how much. I still didn’t know where babies came from even though at eleven there was another addition to the family when my brother was born. My dad took us out for a drive and by the time we got home he had arrived. This ignorance lasted until I was almost fourteen when a precocious friend who was much mature than the rest of us informed us in great detail how babies were conceived. We reacted with disbelief. There was no way my parents indulged in such gross behaviour. However that turned out not to be true when my only sister arrived when I was thirteen.
loved her and as a child spent time in her home in Camlough. She had been a widow 
for twenty odd years. When she died it was my first loss of someone close to me and I was horrified by the whole funeral and burial thing. Similarly my paternal grandmother was a widow and as a result I never knew either of my grandfathers. It seemed normal in those days and I’m just so glad that my grandchildren have known all four grandparents.
pierced and the first to go for a geometric Mary Quant hairstyle. Despite both of us being intelligent we were not studious so tended never to make it to the top of the class. However I excelled at debates and any occasions where I could argue against the status quo. I also had a vivid imagination and my essays were always interesting to say the least.
Pops on a large tape recorder that used large tapes and then played them over and over till my dad said ‘no more’ My friend had a record player and we bought our first single together. It was I think three shillings and four pence and it was Peter and Gordon’s ‘ Please lock me away’
about three and I announced to him that ‘my mammy drinks wickey’ (whiskey). My mum had a little sip when she wasn’t feeling well. My dad had always believed that when we were sick that a little whiskey with hot water and sugar was the answer. Probably be seen as child abuse in today’s politically correct world but it helped us sleep and we definitely felt better. Thankfully his hearing aid was whistling like a kettle so the remark went unnoticed, or so my mother hoped.
Surveyor, would be called out and we waited until the early hours of the morning for his safe return. I would wait until the lights of his car lit up my bedroom as he pulled into the garage at the back of the house and until then sleep was impossible.
We took part in the all Ireland Drama festival at Athlone and came in first. The memory of skipping along that huge stage in a beautiful yellow dress in my bare feet still makes me feel happy. My friends and I used to put on our own concerts for family and friends with 
CHATTER 
