[The author’s mother ran the local post office in Woolaston, Gloucestershire. Her father was a railway foreman for Great Western]. 

One Sunday morning a young man came to church. He was home on holiday from Kenya. He sat in the front row in full view of the choir. I was twelve at the time and I felt this was a good time to be in full voice. The next day when I came home from school I was astonished to hear that he had been to the post office to ask Mother if my voice was being trained to which Mother replied no such thing had been thought of. Not having persuaded Mother to agree that it should be trained he asked if he could help to pay for lessons and even went as far as to offer to take me back to Kenya to see to it himself. 

Mother politely told him that she needed no help to provide for all our needs and most certainly I should not go anywhere out of her care. Father thought that the young man had some ulterior motive and I felt that I had missed some great adventure but the matter was closed with warning not to repeat a word of what had been said.