Golden couple did it their way

Keen Sinatra fans, they are looking forward to seeing The Ratpack at the Congress Theatre in Eastbourne followed by bed and breakfast at the Grand Hotel.

They will also enjoy a tea party for close relatives, neighbours and friends, which will be attended by daughter Clair who lives locally, and son Chris, from Horsham.

Alan and Angela claim to have little in common other than a love of music and teadances, but they were both born in Balham, are both 75, and first met in 1953 when they were both working for Birds Eye Frozen Food in Clerkenwell as telephone sales clerks.

Anglea realised quickly that Alan was the man for her.

"Strangely enough, after three weeks I stopped on the pavement and thought that is who I am going to marry," she said.

"He didn't know, of course. It took him a little longer ... but for me it was like something out of Woman's Own.

"He made me laugh."

Alan commented: "I must have been surrounded by a mystical aura even though I was wearing a brown suit she couldn't stand the sight of - but at the time it was the best I could afford in Charing Cross Road.

He added: "To me, marriage is about who is likely to put up with you in the long run - bearing in mind the difficulty you have putting up with yourself."

They were married in St Mary's Church in Ewell, Surrey, where Angela had grown up, and lived in Wimbledon and Byfleet before settling in Guildford where they stayed for 19 years and raised their family. They had another daughter, Caroline, who passed away four years ago; she had two children, Thomas and Katie.

Alan worked for Unilever at Blackfriars Bridge in the PR department of the United Africa Company.

Looking back over 50 years together, the couple insists they have "nothing in common" other than a passion for music and enjoyment of tea-dances at St Mary Magdalene's church hall.

"What he likes, I don't, and vice versa," said Angela.

Alan commented: "The big disagreement between us is in the evening over the soaps... she watches them, and I think it is the end of civilisation. She doesn't like the news because most of it is bad, but I don't like the soaps because they are bad and not even true."

Angela added: "One funny thing about us we do have in common is we always say please and thank you ... .if I pass him his dinner he says thank you, or if he passes the newspaper, I say thank you to him. We are very big on old world formality."

She is a keen gardener who is also a member of the Allotment Society, and they are both in Bexhill Horticultural Society, the Society of Bexhill Museums, and have just recently joined The Oddfellows. Alan has for 25 years been secretary of the local UN Association, and is chairman of the Workers Education Association in Bexhill.