THOSE of you who hadn't nodded off in the afternoon of Christmas Day 1980 were probably watching St Winifred's School Choir performing their Christmas number one There's No One Quite Like Grandma.

You were looking back on the first year of the decade and thinking it was the dawn of a terrifying era of being nice and wearing knitted jumpers.

Rebels John Lennon and Steve McQueen had died and you had to put up with a song about an old woman whose idea of fun was boiled sweets and Cliff Richard.

But if you'd read News Shopper closely during 1980 you'd have seen there was plenty to be happy about.

On March 20 we reported schools in Bromley were "amongst the leaders in the field of computer education, with nearly every secondary school in the borough owning or having access to a micro-computer or a terminal".

With only one computer per school and no internet, how did children communicate? Surely not by talking face-to-face? That would be absurd.

It was good to see News Shopper reaching out to its female audience in 1980.

Female Focus, a page dedicated to the ladies, contained tips on cooking, make-up and fashion.

Ladies, I apologise on behalf of all men. We honestly thought this was all you were interested in.

News Shopper had its own resident disco king in Neil Taylor, who wrote a Night Life column throughout 1980 telling people where they could go to boogie.

Apparently the Bickley Arms near Chislehurst Station was the place to be. By the look of Neil's photo he was 13, so he must have had a good fake ID to get in.

Last week I told you about a News Shopper article written in 1976 about fat dogs.

I'm glad to say our readers, including the police, followed the diet tips for porky pooches as on April 3 we reported on Viking the police dog who caught an armed criminal.

I'm also glad to say society in general learnt from Christmas Day 1980, as I don't recall any more songs dedicated to grandmothers.