I have always written – I have been a scribbler since I was eight years old. At the age of eight I read the story of Bambi. I cried when Bambi’s mother was shot by a hunter. I rewrote the story of Bambi and gave it a happy ending. I told Little-friend-Susan I had written a book.

“What is it called?” asked Susan.

“Bambi,” I reply.

I was too young to have heard of plagiarism.

My uncle sent us a box of stationery every few months so I always had lots of paper on which to write.

By the time I was twelve years old it was a constant battle to get me to clean my room. The floor was always littered with paper – stories, drawings, poems.

One day my father said that if I did not clean my room he would burn everything. I didn’t believe him and decided I would do it in a few days.

I came home from school one sunny Autumn day and saw Dad tending a rather large bonfire down the back of our property.

‘Oh what a lovely bonfire,’ I thought.

Walking into my bedroom I noticed how bare it looked – how clean! And for the first time I noticed there was a pattern of roses around the border of the rug in my room.

I ran down to the bonfire, all my scribbles, my short stories, drawings, film star photos, cut-out dolls (probably too old for those but I liked to design clothes for them) and my Bambi book were burning.

Pointing to my green felt pig – piggy – slowly being cremated by fire, I cried, “Not piggy, I have had him since I was three years old. Not piggy, how cruel.”

“You are too old for that toy,” my father said.

It was a cruel lesson that day, but my father’s actions taught me to be clean and tidy. However sometimes in a moment of nostalgia I wish I could once again read my childhood stories, especially my version of Bambi.