Well, what have we here - Bradders writing a column in the paper? Hardly likely, you may say.

Well, I'm going to be penning my thoughts - or rather typing them, as I can't write properly any more - each Friday, just looking back on the week and reflecting on local life.

For those of you who may think this is my first spell with the Evening News, it isn't.

Many, many years ago, aged 16, I began employment with the old News and Times in the offices in the Trinity, in Worcester. Anyone remember the old presses rattling away? Folks used to stop and look in though the doors to watch them.

Those were the days when we used to wait for the result of the 5.45pm race at Haydock for the late editions, but newspapers have changed a good deal since then.

I remember one of my first jobs was taking the papers to town on the old carrier bike, the one with the big basket on the front.

This was OK in the week, but on Friday when you got a massive paper, you would put them on the front of the bike, and it would then tip up. It was a real feat of balance to get through the busy town centre traffic to the paper sellers.

And what characters they were! For me, a 16-year-old from the country, they were a constant source of fun.

Like Johnny O'Shea in Angel Place. "Shocking tragedy" was Johnny's favourite cry, although nine times out of 10 there was no "shocking tragedy". The county cricket ground in the summer was one of his haunts as well, along with "Curley", whose cry was "Scorecard or a Worcester book".

But back to those paper sellers. Sam Smith outside the post office would read a book in an afternoon while selling papers at the same time. A lovely man was Sam, fond of a game of snooker and a pint or two.

There was also Ernie Maisey and his son Ernie, on his bike round the "Arbo", Nanny Evans in the Trinity and, of course "Chicken George" Georgie Webb, still around on his electric wheelchair. He went to Upton Point to Point on Easter Tuesday with 200 papers in a canvas bag and came back the next day having sold all the papers - and the bag as well!