Television and takeaways: how our lives have changed since the days of black and white TV

I was 11 when we first got our first colour TV, I used to rush home from school just to watch it.

I remember at that time one of the big political parties was holding its annual party conference, so I was basically rushing home to watch a political conference, in colour.

It would have been nice if it was slightly more child-friendly, but that was overridden by the new novelty of colour.

Before then, we were only able to access two channels, BBC 1 and 2, no ITV

When my school friends spoke about Calendar, I had no clue what they were talking about.

When I got slightly older a popular phrase, to use when someone was irritating you , was “sit on it ” .

That put down flew straight over my head, it wasn’t until we gained access to the third channel, ITV, did the penny drop.

This was a popular phrase from the American TV show Happy Days and the phrase was a phrase coined by The Fonz played by Henry Winkler.

Television at that time was still relatively a new concept, and wasn’t the same as it is now.

When there was a programme you wanted to see you absolutely made sure you were there to watch it, as that would be your only chance, for some time.

You wished there could be some device to record the programme, or it be repeated again an hour later or later in the week, how great would that be?

Fridays were always a great day for television with one of the channels having a season of popular films such as Norman Wisdom, St Trinian’s, Carry On or The Beatles films, all seen as family friendly and humorous.

Back then you had to make a conscious decision to watch your particular programme or film, or miss it for an indeterminate period.

What I take from that era is that when a popular programme or film was shown either at the weekend or Christmas, like The Morecambe and Wise Christmas special, all the family would congregate in the same room together jockeying for position, and a seat – mums, dads, all the children all together.

Modern technology has seen a proliferation of programmes to see, infinite channels and platforms on which to watch them, catering to the wishes of the public.

With so many recording devices to catch up or options to watch at a later date no one has to be concerned about watching at the time of broadcast, and can catch up at their leisure.

Also most houses have several devices to watch TV on.

Which means on many, if not most, occasions families will very rarely spend time together even if they’re in the same house to watch TV.

This is also the same for meals, with people turning up or eating whenever they feel like, courtesy of the microwave or takeaways.

Technology has given us so many options when it comes to our viewing, or eating our meals, but has also brought separation to our family lives and in our own homes too.