THIS week the mobile phone turns 40 and, let's face it, it's only got better with age, unlike some I could mention.

The first ever phone call was made by Mark Cooper, the inventor of this life-changing device back in 1973, on a Motorola handset weighing more than a kilo which could manage only 20 minutes of talk time before the battery needed a 10-hour charge.

If only I could find a handset today with those features that would be my mother's next birthday present sorted.

I remember the first time someone in school brought in a mobile phone to show everyone and being so completely jealous of this glorious, futuristic thing that I simply had to have or life was just not worth continuing on with.

After begging my parents for three months solid, I finally got my first mobile phone in 1995 at the age of 15, although the dream soon turned into a bit of a nightmare when I realised that £5 worth of credit lasted me about two days.

My sister Lynsey and I decided that we needed to address this lack of credit issue and came up with a cunning plan that we would use our mobile phones to send text messages only and use the house phone to make all of our calls.

We spent the next few months smugly patting ourselves on the back for our genius plan that couldn't possibly fail until we came home one day after school to find my mother totally distraught clutching her quarterly itemised phone bill, which was usually about £100 maximum, screaming at the top of her lungs about the £400 she now owed to BT due to the 110 mobile phone calls made in the last three months from our landline.

My mother's fury was, however, the least of our worries as the next day we came home to discover our lovely little cream coloured house phone, that had once sat minding its own business on the kitchen work surface, was gone and instead sat a huge big ugly grey pay phone in its place.

My 14-year-old sister and I almost fainted with the shock and disbelief as to what we were seeing. I mean that was it, our cool teenage lives were over and there was no way we could face anyone in school now with a public pay phone sitting in the middle of the kitchen.

We cried, screamed and got down on our knees begging my mother to have it taken away but no, she would not be moved.

The next three months it took to pay the bill were humiliating beyond belief.

We had to save every penny of our pocket money to use the phone, I still remember the embarrassment of the beeps cutting in mid conversation when the money had run out and having to ask my friends to call me back.

The mobile phone has come a long way in 40 years and the mind boggles to think what is yet to come with new technology, although to this day I still cannot call a mobile number from a landline. Lesson well learned!

:: THERE are now only a few tickets left for one of the best shows in town. The fabulous Robert and May Miller, along with a star-studded line-up, are bringing Divas to the East Kilbride Village Theatre on April 23, 24 and 25.

I have got my ticket and hope to see you all there.

Tickets can be purchased at www.boxoffice.

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