Where were you born, and what was your childhood like?
I was born in 1946 in a place called Hollinwood. From the name you might imagine this was a pretty place deep in a forest. Not a bit of it. It was a small area on a main throughfare halfway between the smoky northern towns of Manchester and Oldham, in Lancashire, England. My family had a little shop selling sweets and tobacco, just by the side of the very busy road, where cars and buses sped past my bedroom window at all times of the day...