Bruce Scott : Dunedin NZ : 1960s

My mother took me to see the Beatles.

Uncool? Nah, it was great.

The audience screamed, she screamed. The band sang, she sang. Ringo shook his mop-top, she shook her perm.

I can't remember if Mum asked me to go to the show with her or vice versa. Whatever, it was the start of my concert-going habit that kicked off with early shows by the Stones, the Pretty Things ... and has never stopped.

Unofficial Mother-of-the-Year 1964, Marjie Scott, who was cool enough to take her son to see the Beatles.

The Fab Four came to our town in June 1964. In those days they did two concerts a night, one at six the other at 8.30. We were at the early show. Mum wanted to be able to say she was one of the first people in our town to see the Beatles.

They possibly opened with She Loves You. Who'd know? The screaming was at banzai level the moment they appeared on stage and didn't stop until long after they'd gone.

The first time I heard the Beatles was in late 1962. I'd made a little crystal set using directions I'd found in an old hobby magazine, bought some very basic headphones and rigged up a piece of wire as an aerial on the roof of our house.

The Beatles arrive in Wellington and are presented with the largest plastic tiki in the world. They were astounded that such a tiny country could produce such an enormous souvenir. [Reference: 1/4-071857-F : Photographer: Morrie Hill : Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.]

On a good night, I could pick up Ward "Pally" Austin's show on 2UE, way over in Australia. One night, crackling across the airwaves, swooping in and out of radio range, came Love Me Do by a band called the Beatles. Something about that song shifted things in my teenage life.

Next morning, anxious to hear it again, I tuned our kitchen radio to the local radio station most likely to play it. It was probably a fortnight later before, at last, I heard the song again. In the next few weeks followed Please, Please Me, then From Me To You, then She Loves You, then ... the Beatles binge had begun. I was hooked. Apparently, Mum was too.

So there we were, mother and son, at the Town Hall, upstairs, middle, two rows back, hooting and hollering, having the time of our lives thanks to the greatest band in the world.

She's 86 now and we still talk about that night like it was yesterday.