Unlike Roifield and Lucy, and esteemed callerinnerers who have been listening to The Archers since tender youth, I’ve only been acquainted with this radio institution for a comparatively short eight years, after being introduced to it by The Other Half. He listened to it at his grandmother’s knee and continues, unabashed, into middle age (ahem).
The introduction formed part of a cultural swap: he gave me The Archers; I gave him Made in Chelsea (clearly, my part of the deal was better than his).
I had experienced The Archers briefly before then, when Ruth was having an affair with Sam (because everyone was talking about it). However, after hearing Ruth repeatedly sighing behind the silage clamp and failing to actually do anything about it, I hung up my virtual Barbour and wellies, dismissing the whole shebang as ‘boring’. How wrong I was.
I’m not one for soaps, but I do like a good bit of radio. Vast mugs of tea, Sunday’s omnibus and the obligatory post-mortem discussion have become an essential weekend ritual at Blithe Spirit HQ.
How did you start listening to The Archers?