McHugh, Melvyn: - Melvyn McHugh was born in 1953 in a small rural village in Essex. From the age of five, his journey to school passed by a garden centre, an army camp, several fruit orchards and a small village shop. While most boys of his age played football and fighting games, Melvyn would invent stories and then, most often, act them out as the hero or main character.
His after-school activities included collecting lizards, snakes, climbing trees, scrumping, and occasionally catching the odd chickens.