“Ooh, baby, you couldn't have done a worse thing to me
If you'da taken an arrow and run it right through me.”

23rd November 1988 was a significant day in the history of Doctor Who. Yes, 23rd November 1988 was the day my first VHS recorder broke. Something that only became apparent at 19:35 when the machine steadfastly refused to play-and-record at the same time, as Oliver Elmes’ purple title sequence kicked in for the start of Silver Nemesis Part One.

I watched the episode anyway, of course. While my parents watched Coronation Street (a process described in earlier issues of this newsletter) I watched the Doctor Who silver anniversary story upstairs in black and white, and a panic. This time there was no comforting certainty that the episode was being recorded in colour downstairs, and that it could be rewatched tomorrow as JNT and PAL intended, once I’d got home from school.

At school that particular week I quickly ascertained that a friend had managed to record the episode, borrowed his tape and made plans to copy it within the week. Regular readers will be aware that I was able to copy tapes if my Grandad walked his own VHS player over from his house round the corner. But towards the end of 1988, he’d upgrade his video recorder again, to a sleek black front-loading thing which had a remote control; which meant he could now copy tapes whenever he liked. Grandparental approval notwithstanding, so could I - and once this was done his “spare” VHS player was lent to us while we had the old one repaired.¹