FIona Corbet

I’m Fiona Corbett, who was Fiona Burdett.

I drank in the Tavern from fifteen, sixteen years old, for maybe three or four years. I went in with Maggie Kitchen on a Saturday afternoon, apparently, though I’ve no memory of it whatsoever. I’d heard about the pub from my older brother, and we probably tottered in on heels trying to make ourselves look a bit older. I remember all the ripped seats, and I think someone had a pet rat on their shoulder. It was always very dark in there. You could smoke in there as well, then. So it was dark and smoky. Most pubs were, I suppose.

We got served, and that was it, I was hooked! Because I couldn’t get a drink in the Springhill, which is where I kept trying to get served, because the landlord knew my boss at the time, so he knew I wasn’t eighteen.

In most pubs, they’d ask How old are you? and as long as you went I’m eighteen you were OK. You didn’t have photo ID then, so as long as you could come out with your date of birth and the right star sign – and didn’t turn up in your school uniform – you were fine. You played the game and that was it. I was getting half-fare on the bus to town, to go and drink in the pub.

My boss rented a house to the Angels, so I’d met them through work, and I wasn’t as scared of them as I might have been otherwise. They used to embarrass me and tease me, but because I knew some of them and they recognised me, they kept an eye on me, and didn’t give me a hard time.

We went in the Tavern because there were people there we knew. And for the music, and the bikes. I used to wear a leather jacket, jeans, a jacket with fringes on it, a shaggy perm. Big, hoop earrings. Big hair. Very ’80s hair. Yeah. You felt comfortable because you knew other people in there would be wearing similar sort of clothes and like the same sort of music. I drank Strongbow. Woodpecker was too sweet. Beer tasted far too grown-up. I think I drank far too much when I was there, because I can’t remember anything!

Some days I’d go to the Tavern before the football. I’d go with my friend, who became my husband. We’d have a drink before the match, go down to the Molineux, and then by the time the match had finished, places were re-opening. And when we were a little bit older and I could get served in local pubs, we’d get the last bus from town, and get last orders out of town, because it was half ten in town, and eleven outside. I think we used to get the last bus to the Springhill Cottage.

The Tavern died a death when they had a refurb, put the lights on. It was horrible. Bright red. They moved the bar as well. I don’t think I actually ever went in when it was Moriarty’s.