A COUPLE who met at the age of five are celebrating their golden wedding anniversary today.

Edna and Geoffrey Robbins met in class at Holt Heath Primary School in 1941, and became a couple 13 years later.

Mrs Robbins, a retired care nurse of Harrington Road,

St John's, Worcester, said of her husband: "He never liked girls at school but I always had a crush on him.

"Then at 18 he went into the Army to do national service and didn't come back for two years. When he returned I sent him a Valentine's card and he asked me to a Valentine's dance at Sinton Green."

But even after that, said Mrs Robbins, aged 70, it was not all plain sailing.

"He then asked me to go to the cinema with him on the following Sunday and I said I'd meet him on the bus.

"But when he got on he walked straight past me and sat at the back. It wasn't until we got there that he spoke."

But love blossomed and they married two years later at Holt Church on March 24, 1956.

The couple have four children - Carol, Stephen, Mark and Janet - who went on to give them 11 grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

They made sure the happy couple celebrated in style by surprising them last weekend with a trip to Holt church to renew their vows. Today, they are all off for a weekend break in Paignton, Devon.

Mrs Robbins said she and her husband - who was a farm worker before he started a career on the buses with Midland Red West - had so many happy memories from the past 50 years.

And she had this advice to newlyweds: "Bear with it; whatever your troubles, work them out and you'll get by.

"We struggled to cope with no money to start with but we always worked as a team and couldn't be happier."