It's the end of an institution: come the summer Top of the Pops will be no more. The essential cultural touch-point for British youth of the 60s, 70s and 80s, the show's relevance declined as MTV arrived, heralding the end of an era when half an hour on BBC1 was the only place you could see what your favourite pop stars looked like.
TOTP, recording Radio 1's Top 20 and learning lyrics from Smash Hits by rote were the only means by which I could tell there was life outside of Northampton in the 70s.
For some - my Dad, for example - TOTP's allure had more to do with the promise of a baffling but comely dance interpretation from Pans People or Hot Gossip (sorry, I mean Legs & Co).
But, for me, TOTP was never the same when, in 1996, it changed from a Thursday evening showing to Friday. Thursday seemed to hold the promise of the weekend ahead, whereas by Friday at 7pm I was already one cider into it. I was admittedly, almost 30 by then, so perhaps it was time to give up TOTP.
My interest in TOTP waned, and so did that of many other pop-pickers. By the time it was shunted over to Sundays on BBC2, half its viewers had been lost. And now TOTP has given us up. Nobody really cares anymore but its legend will live on.
