I used to wear a bra to cover my emerging ‘moobs’, the result
of a beer-filled diet, then stroll through the gay town of Brighton,
curious to what lay within its environs,
sometimes donning a skirt and panties, enthusiastically greeted by camp males, who saw in me a kindred spirit.

Although actually heterosexual – when inviting a female for afternoon tea, I was so boring; she would often leave before we could order the crumpets.

So, to remind myself of the female form, I would visit the naturist beach, but was too shy to undress.

Yet I somehow managed, while hiding behind a sand hill,
to chat with an athletic woman called Doris,
who told me she was a rugby league forward,
who played for Tiddleton Trumpets,
a team formed by Bernard Bigmills,
a brass band enthusiast from Castleford.

Made redundant from a coal mine, he’d gained fame as a dinosaur fossil hunter, digging up a beast with a large bottom,
which scientists obligingly named Berniesawrosaurispuss.
 
Doris invited me for a drink in The Peckish Parrot,
where I confessed to wearing women’s underwear.
But to my surprise she said, ‘Oh, I can see you might need some support.

‘Now it’s my turn to confess – I have an alter ego called ‘Grinning Gusset’, an act inspired by my dad, Feisty Fortescue Fiddle-Flannet.

‘When his magic went wrong, he would be hit with an umbrella, by my mum,
‘Angry Antoinette’, from the French city of Carcassonne.’

Doris, looking me up and down, said, ‘You’re only small,
so maybe you could join me in my act as a subject of comic ridicule.’

Well, I’ve always been sensitive about my height,
since my first sexual adventure with a girl called Dawn, whom I met hop-picking.
 
She remarked, as we both stretched to pick a juicy grape,
‘My Norman, you are a tiny picker,
if you want a snog, you’ll have to stand on a milking stool!’

When Doris and I met again at the beach, I was cajoled into joining her on a run,
after which she fell asleep, her snores attracting the sea gulls,
one of whom swooped and nicked my pork pie.

So I stormed off to The Slippery Seagull, a pub owned by famous sculptor, Derek Dilldun,
another redundant coal miner.

‘My,’ I mused, ‘these Yorkshire men aren’t half inventive.’
 
He said, ‘By the way, Norm,’ and here I must apologise,
for he was prone to use the odd invective, ‘I saw Doris score an effing good try.’

The next week I watched the Women’s Rugby League Challenge Cup Final,
to see the woman herself score under the posts, then, the score at 10-all,
kick a winning drop goal.

On a whim I visited the beach where I’d met this sporting star,
and was left gasping as she sprinted up and down a huge sand hill,
apparently to develop aerobic capacity, then listened entranced,
as she told me how Irish PE teacher, Mary McPlash
(which is Gaelic, meaning ‘Wise head who sees so far’),
after watching her in the 100-yards dash, exclaimed,
‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I’ll try that girl out at rugby!’

Doris eventually accepted my marriage proposals, the last one made
as she crossed the try line in yet another bruising game.

After dragging me round the field to the fans’ applause, she said,
‘I was just testing the strength of your desire, Tim, I was always going to say yes.’

We celebrated at that naughty club Funny Girls, with Bernard Bigmills,
and barmaid Sue, dressed as pterodactyls, along with Doris’s father, Fortescue,
with his old stage partner, Antoinette.

He said, ‘Ah daughter,’ he cried, ‘I knew you had a good act, as Grinning Gusset.
But I never thought you, being a woman, could play rugby.’

‘Well done, lass!’

His daughter cried, ‘Oh dad, you are a dinosaur!’

Then Bernard put his hand up, shouting, ‘No, that’s me!’

Doris, annoyed at this interruption, asked ‘What do you think, mum?’
But ‘Angry’ Antoinette, with a Gallic shrug, simply said ‘Oui’.

Derek Dilldun, that artistic landlord of The Slippery Seagull, as a wedding present,
idolised my sweetheart in stone, and now people flock to see his amazing sculpture.

Now, I’m glad to say, I don’t feel remotely ‘queer’.
But I was left red-faced when, on our honeymoon, in the Spanish resort of Benidorm,
a drag act saw me and shouted, ‘Hey isn’t it Norm, from Brighton?

‘Oy! Don’t run off, you owe me a pair of panties, and a D-cup brassiere!’