Tracey Thorn

I’ve just finished reading Tracey Thorn’s memoir, Bedsit Disco Queen. It’s a delight. She’s so normal – witty, self-depreacting, refusing to get carried away by celebrity nonsese. but she’s very sharp, too, clever and revealing about making music and writing songs. I’ve got four A4 pages of favourite quotes, and this is one of my favourites.

“Like all mums, I sang to my kids at home, so they knew what my voice sounded like, and once when I walked into a branch of Gap, pushing Blake in a pushchair, ‘Missing’ was playing loudly. He twisted round to look at me, little finger pointing upwards towards the source of the music. ‘Mummy!’ he exclaimed in a tone of pure amazement. ‘You are singing in the shop.’ When he started at school, he came home one day and said to me, ‘Mum, did you used to be famous?’

‘Um, sort of, a bit,’I replied.

‘It’s just my teacher says she’s got all your records.’ ”