At the risk of sounding like those obviously fake stories that end “and everybody applauded”, I’d like to share a lovely little real-life movie moment that happened to me yesterday.

I was bouncing around the flat with my youngest and, as I often do, I picked up a guitar to plonk away on it. I came up with a wee tune I quite liked so I went over to the computer to record it and try a few other ideas. Mid-way through putting down the bass line, which I was happily headbanging along to, there was a clatter to the side of me and then a beat. My youngest, who’s just recently started learning drums, had sneaked onto the kit. One perfectly executed drum roll later and we were both locked into the same tune, playing along to the recorded guitars. I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry – it’s the first time something like this has happened – so I did a bit of both, grinning with watering eyes.

As someone with a lifelong love of music I’ve always hoped my kids would have the same, but I’ve also been very wary about trying to live vicariously through them: the instruments – so many instruments – are there if they want to play them and I’ll enthuse about music all day long, but I’d never try to get my kids to play instruments or listen to music they don’t want to play or listen to. So it’s really lovely to have my eldest fall in love with bass guitar and my youngest fall in love with the drums of their own accord.