This post is a collaboration with TV Licensing (a trademark of the BBC), but all thoughts and experiences are my own.
I am now 42 years old - I grew up with a TV in our home and have witnessed that TV has grown more and more popular in households across the UK and how much it brings people together, from watching live sport on TV with friends to watching a series with your partner. Of course, when I was younger there wasn't such a variety of programmes to watch, but I remember loving the ones I did watch and now I can look back on those times and see how much watching TV shows with friends and family created some special memories and moments that connected us.
As part of the TV Licensing campaign, I have been asked to share some of these moments of connection with you and I have really enjoyed sitting down and remembering these moments and trying to bring them to life for you. TV Licensing is a trademark of the BBC - probably THE household name when we think of television programming in the UK. TV Licensing helps people know when and if they need to buy a TV Licence. Did you know that the money raised through TV Licensing is not retained revenue, but it is passed on to fund BBC projects within the UK, including BBC News, shows, BBC Sounds, and 10 BBC radio stations, all without ads.
Your TV Licence lets you enjoy a huge range of live TV. It covers you for:
- All TV channels, like BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Dave and international channels - but you don't need a licence if you only watch non BBC channels on-demand
- Pay TV services, like Sky, Virgin Media, and BT - but these are platforms that could have both live and on-demand services
- Live TV on streaming services, like YouTube and Amazon Prime Video
- Everything on BBC iPlayer.
This includes recording and downloading. On any device.
It is amazing value when you think of it like this, and it has enabled me to have these wonderful memories I am about to share with you.
Live and Kicking
Hands up who remembers this Saturday morning TV show for kids?! This was the highlight of my week, and as a family of limited means, we didn't do much at the weekends so watching this with my brother was quite the highlight of the week. It was fun and engaging and a great way to start the weekend when you are 10! It brought my brother and I together too, as a sort of shared routine, as we didn't have a lot in common otherwise! So many of the presenters have gone onto be real household names too - Zoe Ball, Jamie Theakston, Andi Peters, Emma Forbes, John Barrowman, Ortis Deley, Katy Hill, and Sarah Cawood amongst others.
Casualty
One of my most enduring childhood memories is watching Casualty with my mum. It was on a Saturday evening and my younger brother wasn't allowed to watch it because it was too late for him, and it was too grown up. It was the one moment in the whole week I had my mum to myself, and I felt so grown up! I shared a room with my brother so I had to go to bed and pretend to be asleep and when Casualty started, my mum would creep in and get me out of bed to watch it with her. We would sit on the sofa and eat Galaxy chocolate. It was something so simple, but it meant a lot to me to have that special time with my mum.
Photo by Mikhail Nilov on Pexels.com
Top of the Pops
Can you even write about childhood TV traditions and moments of connection without mentioning Top of the Pops?! I loved this show and, especially as I got older, would watch it with friends from school. We would think we were so cool keeping on top of the latest music trends, and it would inspire us into what we would spend our pocket money on in the local Our Price store. Remember the time when you could buy singles and albums on CD?! Who was number one was always a talking point at school, and of course, there were the random tracks that somehow made it into the charts that kept us entertained - hello, Mr Blobby! I must admit to being absolutely gutted when Top of the Pops was cancelled.
Maddie's Do You Know
This programme got me through lockdown and homeschooling! I kid you not, this was our treat that the children and I would sit down together to watch after a day of homeschooling. It is educational but is also entertaining TV so the perfect bridge between 'schoolwork' and home time, in an era where the two were intertwined. For me, certainly, and probably for the children, it marked the end of the working day and the moment they got their 'mum' back after I'd had to be 'Mrs Mummy' all day as they called me then! This, coupled with our one-hour walks I will take with me as positive and memorable moments that were highlights in an otherwise awful time.
A bingeable series
As I have gotten older, I still notice the ability that TV has for connecting people and bringing us together. Now I talk to people about the latest series of The Traitors, The Apprentice, or the latest TV series - it is a great conversation starter!
Now I have children and go out less, I consider a good night to be one where we get a takeaway and I snuggle up with my husband in the evening to watch a drama series. It's a moment to have some time to ourselves once the children are in bed and forget about day-to-day worries that plague us as adults.
Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels.com
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