On a cold and dark rainy midweek night, i am choosing to ignore the continuing aches in my shoulder (caused by my very own personal gremlin or sprite) by pausing to reflect upon some of the simplest and most happy memories of my life.

To begin with, i'll have to take you into the garden, where better to meet The Herbs? Many is the delirious lunchtime i spent eagerly following the adventures of Parsely the lion, Dill the dog, Constable Knapweed, Bayleaf the gardener, Aunt Mint, Taragon the dragon, Sage the owl and many others. I can still remember the garden coming into view upon the magic word herbidacious!

Not only that but i can also still remember each characters personal theme song, i'll sing them all to you if you don't believe it!

Our next trip is into outer space, to a tiny planet inhabited by pink knitted creatures that communicate in melodious whistles (i understood every word of it) and the guardian of the food-source, the Soup Dragon. This is the planet of The Clangers of course, visited by froglets and an iron chicken, featuring a friendly cloud that rained music and that sumptuous delicacy, blue-string pudding.

No time to stay for tea however, as we're now off to sail the high seas aboard The Black Pig, to resume battle with that old seadog Cut-Throat Jake with our hearty piratical shipmates, faithfully under the ever-bumbling command of Captain Pugwash. You can hear the theme-tune in your head right now, admit it.

There is just time for a quick spin on The Magic Roundabout with our old friends Dougall, Florence, Zebedee, Brian and Ermintrude, not forgetting the flaked-out hippy rabbit, Dylan.

We didn't have wall-to-wall kids tv in my day but were rationed to the odd hour here and there in between the grown-up programmes and the test card...i sometimes wonder what became of that little girl who used to play noughts-and-crosses with that clown...she'll be a granny by now i guess.

I seem to have run out of time tonight but i'll briefly mention a few other favourites of mine from yesteryear such as The Pink Panther, The Banana Splits, The Woodentops, Mr Benn, Trumpton, Ivor the Engine, Bagpuss...oh, i could go on all night!
Where did they all go?
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