I was privileged to have Katy as my best friend in the giddy years of 15-18  (and lucky enough then to retain that friendship), and I don’t want to lower the tone here but I would like to fly the flag for her glorious irreverence, which was what first drew me to her.


Today the memory came to mind of when, as sixth formers, we were both in the school play, The Crucible:  me as Elizabeth Proctor and Katy as her maid, Mary Warren.  At one point in the play, Mary Warren shyly presents Elizabeth Proctor with a ‘poppet’ – a kind of rag doll – which she has sewn during the long hours at court, and a puzzled Elizabeth Goody has to say in response,  ‘Why, thank you, it’s a fair poppet’. 


Our problem was that it wasn’t in the least ‘fair’;  it was, frankly, horrid:  a limp, grubby grotesque.  Worse, it clearly had sentimental value for our (adored) teacher, Mr Edwards (presumably from previous performances during his lifetime of directing school plays). 


So, whenever Katy presented me with this creepy thing  (under the earnest gaze of Mr Edwards, under the spotlights) I would steel myself to deliver the required line, and we’d try so very hard not to catch each other’s eyes, but it was no good and that was that:  we’d dissolve into helpless, guilty, delicious laughter.  I can’t now recall how we ever got through the public performances, although perhaps by taking every opportunity to release tension backstage by flinging that awful thing around between us (once, I’m ashamed to say, being spotted by a sorrowful-looking Mr E).


Typical standard schoolgirl japes, I know, but, still, that phrase ‘Why, thank you, it’s a fair poppet’ came down forty years with us, standing for so much else and never failing to delight us.  There haven’t been any laughs of late but just remembering this today has had me laughing and I know Katy would join in me that.