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King Rollo was an animation created by David McKee, who was also creator of the much loved (by me, anyway) Mr. Benn.
The series was about the titular King Rollo, who though he appeared quite grown up (he even had a beard!) he was actually quite child like in nature, playing with toys and, to be frank, being told what to do by his cook and his magician. So it was he spent most of his time learning about the world, ably assisted by his cat Hamlet, who also appeared to be more grown up and worldly wise than his master.
When King Rollo got bored playing by himself he had his next door neighbour Queen Gwen (two castles next door to each other, what a street that must be to live in!) to play with and also fellow King Frank.
The characters in the cartoon did not speak. Instead it was down to narrator Ray Brooks (who also narrated Mr. Benn as it happens) to do all the talking. As I recall he did change the sound of his voice slightly when one of the characters was supposed to be saying something, but it was more a change of inflection rather than a put on accent or something.
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Only When I Laugh was an ITV sitcom that was set in an NHS hospital ward and ran from 1979 until 1982 over four series. It revolved around three inhabitants of the ward, their surgeon and a male orderly. I don’t know what was wrong with these three guys, but it couldn’t have been good if they were in hospital for four years – though none of them really seemed to suffer from much in the way of symptoms!
Who isn’t a big fan of the Muppets? From their beginnings on Sesame Street at the end of the sixties through the classic The Muppet Show and 
One of the most familiar names in kitchen gadgetry, 
As good as the Inspector Gadget cartoon was, I could never quite work out exactly what Inspector Gadget himself was. Since he had a niece called Penny I always assumed he must be human, but given that he had extending arms and legs and flip top fingers he always appeared to be more robotic in nature. I guess then he must have been some kind of human-android hybrid, in which case having all those gadgets fused into his body must have been quite painful.
Good old John Craven. I’m not quite sure how he did it, but somehow he took the most boring programme on TV (the news) and turned it into something kids wanted to watch. Maybe it was his snazzy selection of jumpers, or perhaps his teacher like demeanour, or perhaps it was just because John Craven’s Newsround only lasted for about five minutes, so you didn’t have time to get bored?
Have you ever remembered something from your childhood that when you mention it to other people they look at you strangely and think you’re mad, and that you must be making it up? Today’s post is a good example of this phenomenon.
Back in the eighties I remember a lot of Hollywood films mentioning a TV channel called MTV, and wondering what it was all about. It got to a point where if teenage characters in a movie was meant to be cool, they would just have to mention MTV and that was it – instant coolness.
