The Day I Met My Teen Idols Duran Duran

Duran Duran existed in my record player, my scrapbook and in my dreams at night. Like many teenagers in the 1980s, I had every inch of my bedroom wallpapered with their faces. Nothing was spared; even my piano was covered with pictures from Smash Hits. On that piano I taught myself to play ‘Save a Prayer’ which, incidentally, sounds magical as a keyboard solo, although my musical prowess disappeared many years ago, along with my Duran Duran magazine collection.

In 1984, Duran Duran toured Australia, and word had gotten out they were staying at the Perth Hilton. The day after the concert, with ears still ringing, throat raw from squealing, I dressed in my uniform and pretended to go to school. My friends and I took a bus to the city, snuck up the back entry of the Hilton and up the staff elevator.

Somebody had told us which rooms the band was staying in (yeah, right) so we took a bunch of love letters and shoved them under the doors that supposedly housed Simon, Nick, John, Roger and Andy. My letter to Nick read something like “I will love you forever,” and after depositing it under ‘his’ door (at best: a roadie, at worst: an anonymous businessman) we went downstairs where hundreds of girls were milling outside the tour bus.

Suddenly those divine men appeared, battling their way through the crowd and (joy!) I managed to touch…