John Bishop - How Did All This Happen?

At school the following week we had a special assembly in which the headmistress told us to pray for my friend. He was not a close friend – he was one of a bunch of mates – but I remember him being cheeky and funny. I also remember him being held up lifeless and dead. Apparently, he had decided to snorkel in the big pool against his mum’s wishes and had got his leg caught in the steps underwater. People had seen him, but as he had a mask on, they had assumed he was just snorkelling. The man who had dived in had noticed the boy had not moved for some time. It was said he was already dead when he was pulled out of the pool.

My friend Clive told me his mother went to the funeral, and that our friend had been buried in a white coffin. I was seven years old, and I had seen death close up for the first time. It didn’t really scare me; I knew that one day it would be coming for me. I just wanted to put it off for as long as I could. At least get to an age when I would not be buried in a child’s white coffin.

Most kids play games where you count to 10 when you get shot and then you are alive again. I didn’t play those games very often after that day. I knew dead meant dead, no matter how long you counted for.

I have to say that, despite gaining a sense of mortality, the experience did not stop me thinking I was indestructible. I don’t know if young girls feel the same way or if it’s the result of reading too many comic books where heroes have super-powers, or if it’s the genetic requirement of potentially one day having to hunt or go to war that makes boys assume they will bounce rather than break. If you have ever been in a family centre where they have climbing frames and a ball pool, you will know what I mean. Little girls play and enjoy the colourful surroundings. Boys fly everywhere, and if they have not fallen off everything in the first 20 minutes they have not had a good time.

I was eight years of age and playing football on a field that we called the orchard. The sun was shining and we were getting to play out longer as spring was turning into summer, with the promise of light nights. Beside the patch of grass on which we were playing there was a fence, which I suppose would have been about eight feet high. Behind the fence there was a private garden full of trees. None of us had ever seen these trees bear fruit, but for some reason the area had become known as the orchard.

Ten minutes into the game, one of the boys kicked the ball and it flew over the fence. I volunteered to do the risky job of fetching it, thinking in my eight-year-old mind that I would be a brave hero if I got the ball back: a cross between Steve Austin and Evel Knievel.

I climbed the fence and jumped down to the other side. I ran quickly to get the ball so that I was not shot by the person who lived in the house – nobody to my knowledge was ever shot, but if you are eight years of age and on an adventure you may as well believe you might get shot for the sake of the excitement. It’s either that, or the possibility of being eaten by a dragon.

I retrieved the ball and kicked it back to my friends. I then began to scale the metal wire of the fence that surrounded the orchard, until I reached the top. The fence was made of hardwire, which was spiky at the top. I don’t actually remember what happened next, but I do recall the decision to jump the eight feet or so down to the ground.

Due to the fashions of the time, I was wearing flares that were so wide that the law of gravity would have allowed me to float down had I chosen to do so. However, I decided to jump, and the flares got caught on the spikes and made me fall the entire way: the first, but not the last, time I fell victim to fashion.

I woke up in hospital. I had damaged my kidneys to the extent that the doctors warned my mum and dad I may need a transplant. As it transpired, my kidneys were actually only bruised, and the doctor suggested I was lucky because, for a boy of my age, I had particularly strong stomach muscles: clearly, all of those obsessive sit-ups had not actually been wasted. I think it was perhaps the only time when something I had done alone in my bedroom had proved to be of any use whatsoever.

It was during this time, in Leighton Hospital near Crewe, that I recall for the first time being able to make people laugh. Living in Winsford and surrounded by the people who had been displaced from Liverpool meant that many on the estate sought to hold on to their Liverpool identity in the most obvious way possible: their accent. Similar to second-and third-generation Irish people in America, who become more Irish than the Irish, many on my estate became more Scouse than they would have been had they never left. I basically grew up around people all trying to ‘out-Scouse’ each other, and this made my accent extremely strong.

Many people think it is strong today, but it has become much more comprehensible with age as I have learnt the importance of being able to communicate in a way that allows people to understand you – not something you immediately comprehend as a child. So, when I was eight years of age and lying in a hospital bed, I became somewhat of a source of entertainment. One particular nurse would affectionately call me ‘Baby Scouse’ and would keep on asking me to say things for her amusement; things that more often than not would involve the word ‘chicken’. There is just something about the construction of that word which makes it sound funny when said in a Scouse accent. The nurse would even bring other nurses to my bed, so that I could say the chosen sentence of the day. It would be something like: ‘Why did the chicken cross the road? How do I know? I’m not a chicken!’ Two chickens in one sentence – comedy gold – and the nurses would start their shift with a giggle.

In some respects, this might sound inappropriate behaviour by nursing staff. These days there would be an enquiry, and I would seek compensation for the trauma and victimisation, as well as the anguish that has meant I can no longer eat chicken. However, I not only enjoyed the attention, I also enjoyed the sound of making other people laugh. And not only other people, but strangers, people who knew nothing about me till I said something funny. That sensation has never left me, and I feel blessed that it is now the way I make my living. The other thing that has been with me all my life is the enjoyment of entertaining nurses. However, that is not for this book. Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink. Pass the chicken!

CHAPTER 4 4. School and a Friend Called Kieran 5. Teenage Kicks 6. All I Learnt in School 7. Newcastle 8. I Don’t Eat Meat, or Fight Paratroopers 9. Moving On 10. The Manchester Years 11. The Great U S of A 12. Football 13. Time to Grow Up 14. Learning to Ride 15. Road to Bangkok 16. Indian Days 17. A Day in Buxton Changed Everything 18. A Yank Called Joe 19. A Town That Didn’t Exist 20. Marriage, Fatherhood and Idiot Friends 21. Babies, a Surprise I Didn’t Want and the Snip 22. Bad Hair Day, Removal Vans and Broken Hearts 23. Frog and Bucket 24. Sometimes I Try to Be Funny 25. We All Have to Die on Our Arse Some Time 26. Life Saver 27. How a Wardrobe Can Change Your Life 28. ‘Mum, I’m on Telly!’ 29. Festival of Broken Dreams 30. We Are the Champions! 31. On Tour 32. It’s Always Better When It’s Full 33. Opportunity Knocks 34. 2010 … No Going Back 35. Sport Relief 36. A Family Day at Wembley 37. Week of Hell Picture Section Postscript About the Publisher

SCHOOL AND A FRIEND CALLED KIERAN 4. School and a Friend Called Kieran 5. Teenage Kicks 6. All I Learnt in School 7. Newcastle 8. I Don’t Eat Meat, or Fight Paratroopers 9. Moving On 10. The Manchester Years 11. The Great U S of A 12. Football 13. Time to Grow Up 14. Learning to Ride 15. Road to Bangkok 16. Indian Days 17. A Day in Buxton Changed Everything 18. A Yank Called Joe 19. A Town That Didn’t Exist 20. Marriage, Fatherhood and Idiot Friends 21. Babies, a Surprise I Didn’t Want and the Snip 22. Bad Hair Day, Removal Vans and Broken Hearts 23. Frog and Bucket 24. Sometimes I Try to Be Funny 25. We All Have to Die on Our Arse Some Time 26. Life Saver 27. How a Wardrobe Can Change Your Life 28. ‘Mum, I’m on Telly!’ 29. Festival of Broken Dreams 30. We Are the Champions! 31. On Tour 32. It’s Always Better When It’s Full 33. Opportunity Knocks 34. 2010 … No Going Back 35. Sport Relief 36. A Family Day at Wembley 37. Week of Hell Picture Section Postscript About the Publisher