Tales of Paul (part 2)

The next try we had of seeing Paul play live was a few months later. In the papers it was announced that a new lottery show was to start called Red Alert hosted by Lulu on November 9th 1999. Her first star guest would be Paul McCartney. When I read this I thought ‘I must get tickets for it' so I emailed the BBC who shows the lottery programmes. They replied quickly by telling me that Ginger TV will be filming it, so I must contact them. So I searched the Internet until I found their web site and emailed them with a contact number and address. About 10 days before the show was to be filmed I received a telephone call from a woman called Lucy who worked for Ginger TV. We had a good chat and she said she would put my friend and I on her guest list. The show was to be filmed on the Saturday afternoon at 3.30 pm in Windsor.

Jayne and I booked our coach tickets down to London, we were to set off at 9.30 am and start our return journey back home at 11pm. On the Monday I got a phone call saying we were definitely on the guest list. Then on the Wednesday afternoon I received another phone call from Lucy saying that she had to give our tickets to Paul McCartney for his 'guests' however as we had booked our travel we could go there for 3pm and hope that there might be a chance of getting in. she gave me her mobile number so I could ring when I got there.

So on Saturday morning a little disappointed Jayne and I set off on our coach journey mentally calculating that we should get to London for 1.30 pm and have plenty of time to get to the studios in Windsor. 1.30 came and we were nowhere near London and I started to panic. I asked the hostess about what time we would arrive and she said 2.30 pm. I was really upset by this thinking we will never make it. I looked at our travel tickets then and saw that the hostess was right I also noticed that although we started our journey home at 11 pm we arrived back in Liverpool at 5am the following morning. No one had told me this when we booked so I was now furious at the coach company and panicking about how we were to get to Windsor.

At 2.30pm we were driving through Oxford Street, one of the busiest roads in London and stuck in traffic. I was cursing everybody by this time. We arrived at the coach station at 2.35pm and literally ran for our lives through the streets to get to the train station, which was down the road. Running through the station we got to the ticket office and asked for details of how to get to Windsor. The woman gave us two day travel tickets which we could go anywhere in London or surrounding areas on them. And said we had just missed the 2.45pm train but there was another at 3pm. I knew the filming did not start until 3.30 so we could perhaps still make it so we dashed to the platform that will take us to Clapham Junction where we were to change trains for Windsor. We got to Clapham Junction and ran the length of the station to the platform we needed for Windsor. We had been waiting about 3 minutes when the tannoy started up to announce that the 3 o’clock train to Windsor had been cancelled. We couldn’t believe it all this way for nothing. I asked a porter when the next train was and when he said 3.30pm Jayne and I knew we had to give up. I rang the number that Lucy had given us. I told her as much as I could and then she told us that we would not be able to get in anyway because the place was full. She told us how sorry she was and I thanked her for all she had done for us and put the phone down.

So there was Jayne and I stranded at Clapham Junction, disappointment engulfing us and realising that we could not go home until 11pm, which was 8 hours away. We decided to go back into London and spend the rest of our time there. By 3.30 we were back in Victoria train station wondering what to do. We then thought we might as well go sightseeing and headed off to the Tower of London. We got there at 3.50 and started to queue up. We hadn’t been there long when a guard told us that the Tower shuts at 4pm so we would not get in. Things seemed to be going from bad to worse for us. We got on the tube and decided we might as well go to Harrods, which we did and found that it did not shut until 6pm ‘Hurray!’ we had a walk around and saw the toy dept, the Xmas dept and the pet dept. I bought a bookmark and an address book then we thought ‘what should we do now?’

We decided to go to see Paul’s London home, which is in St John’s Wood. Got on the tube train and made our way there. We couldn’t see anything but we were there and that was the main thing. We even went to Abbey Road Studios wishing we could go in but the security man would not allow us.

It was now coming on to 7pm so I said come on we will go to Kensington High Street near to the home of the late Princess Diana and have something to eat. We got the tube to the nearest station but we had a long walk ahead of us. The walk would take us past the Albert Hall and as we reached it we saw a lot of security and then I realised it was the Remembrance service there as it was Remembrance Sunday tomorrow.

We asked a female policewoman all about it and she told us that she could not say which royals would be there but she knew the Queen and Prince Philip would not be coming. As we stood there Prince Charles arrived and waved at me. Then Princess Anne arrived followed by Prince Edward. Other Royals arrived too and we walked over to the policewoman again to chat with her again. As we did we joked about Prince Andrew. The policewoman said he was going to be hers and I joked he was going to be mine and as we joked he drove up so we waved but he didn’t wave back. It was getting on for 7.30pm now so we said goodbye to the nice policewoman and decided to head back towards the coach station stopping in various places for drinks. We rang home from Knightsbridge from a phone box and saw a public house opposite so we went for a drink. We then headed for Tottenham court road so I could show Jayne all the theatres around there. Stopping not far from the London Palladium Theatre for a cup of coffee.

It was nearly 9 pm and we realised that we hadn’t had anything to eat so we looked for a cheap café or restaurant and ended up at a nearby chip shop. We bought chips (fries) to take out and walked along Oxford Street until we found a seat to sit on to eat our chips. We noticed though as we sat there that the people who passed us looked at me and nodded or smiled, like as if they knew me from somewhere. This made Jayne and I look at each other in puzzlement. We finally decided that maybe they thought I was someone off the TV. This started a hilarious discussion of who it could be they thought I was. It ranged from supermodel Kate Moss through to the comedienne Dawn French. By the time we finished eating we were laughing making passer bys smile too.

At 9.30 we decided we might as well go back to the coach station and wait there so we walked there and found a public house (bar) so we went for another drink until 10.20pm. My feet were aching and sore and we realised we had a really long journey ahead of us. We got on the coach when it arrived and settled down hoping we might get some sleep on it but it was not to be. All night people were talking, mobile phones were ringing and babies were crying. We were tired but relieved to be back when we arrived in Liverpool. We had to wait a while before the buses started as well because it was Sunday so we got home at 6.30am. Jayne went home and I had a cup of tea then went to bed. I got up at 11am and told my family of the tale of our trip to London.

The following day, Monday we were in town having a coffee in the café Lucy in the Sky’s when the owner told us that the date had been set for Paul to play the Cavern again. She told us the date and said she will try and get us tickets but that is yet another part of the story which I will tell you another time.