Some people get by with a lot of talking, like I do. My religious studies teacher called me “garrulous” at which I asked him what it means. “You talk too much Davies” he replied and I went very briefly silent. I suppose this blog is an indication of my talkative side, wittering on might be a better description. I was not really suited to the solitary life of an illustrator silently sharpening my pencils alone, always preferring to have company so I could inflict my wittering on them.

Way back after school and at what people call ‘Uni’ ( Yech! ) these days I ran into a couple of blokes on my year from Lincolnshire.I probably said ” Lincolnshire? Where the hell is that?” Dave wore Buddy Holly glasses and was diminutive figure in the regulation parka of the time, Graham , his school mate was more expansive with an easy laugh. We got on well. They took the mickey out of me and I did my best to do the same to them. This was in the days when trolley buses ran in Manchester. A pre diploma year that is called Foundation these days, a sort of experimental year where we got to try everything before choosing and applying for the degree course we wanted. All three of us applied to Manchester again, Dave and I to Graphic Design and Graham to Sculpture. To my surprise they let me in, and to no surprise the other two got in too.

In our innocence Dave and I thought a career in advertising might be the thing to do, with all the rewards that might bring. Graham thought, well I do not recall what he thought, but he headed for sculpture. All three of us got in on our chosen subject.

In the first degree we shared what was laughingly called a flat in Rusholme. Basically a bedroom with a kitchen the size of a single wardrobe equipped with a baby belling oven. It was the warmest room in the house. I seem to remember that the tiny oven glowed like a mini foundry at times. It was the sort of place that when my father brought me back for one term I would not let him in. When he asked me what it was like I described it with one word: “Spartan”, and then as he looked concerned I said ” at least it’s better than school was”. That seemed to placate him.

We moved up market the next year, Dave and I sharing a house/flat with a couple of others: Bryan and another Paul. Dave and I shared a bedroom and used it to sleep in, Bryan and Paul had the other bedroom where they seemed to talk through the night about the meaning of life. Graham found a place for himself somewhere later discovering that it has a poltergeist that kicked his bed and kept him awake at night. Well, that was his story.

In the final year we went our separate ways. I shared an entire house with several people, including Alan from Hull and Jim from Scunthorpe. Bryan and Dave had a place within walking distance of Old Trafford. The other Paul got a place to himself, none of us had fallen out, it was just a sort of symbiotic thing. I seem to recall that other Paul had got married, so it seemed reasonable to go and find somewhere else, with his new wife.

Dave, Alan and I met up again when we left college, this time we were looking for work, touting our portfolios around the various London ad agencies. One that took Dave’s eye was a place called Boase Massimi Pollit, agencies nearly always took the names of their main founders and directors in those days rather than the intensely right on names that they use today like “Perfect Curve” ( that pinched from W1A off the telly ). BMP was a young agency so had potential, Dave had an interview and got a job as a junior art director.Just like that!

We shared a small flat in Bayswater for a time. Alan too got a job in advertising and in the end so did I, briefly.

As I recall Dave stayed at BMP for 12 years and rapidly climbed the ladder.I’m told he was fired on one occasion but just went back in the next day and they all seemed to forget. He’s a man of few words, a listener and a person with a singular determination. I’ve sort of kept in touch with almost all of them over the years and we are looking at over 50 years ago!. I heard the other day that Dave has gone and got cancer and kept it to himself since 2023. Sort of typical really, not wanting to bother anyone. He’s going to need his singular determination to get through this and I’ve thought about him a lot since I found out.

He got to the very top in advertising, a creative head of a very large advertising agency, and produced some outstanding work.. How did he do it? My theory is that he did it with the same in-built singular determination that he showed all those years ago, when the ‘quiet’ one came to share with the ‘gobby one’, me.

I just hope he doesn’t mind me wittering on about him here. OK Dave?