Studying Latin at school was stimulating. Structure evokes creativity, exploration and play, just as the rules of tennis or chess make you itch to see what is possible.

Those of us who cared about these things did not entirely approve of the Cambridge Latin Course as you had to pick the lingo up naturally as you went along, piqued, presumably, by the stories, which did not turn us on at that age. That the teacher refused to tell us how the grammar worked we regarded as a waste of our young time: we wanted to get into the language. We thought it was tossy.

After all, a baby starts to pick up its first languages from within its mother's womb. The brain is developmentally attuned to this task at that time of life. But now you are 10 you have your first language and your brain moves on to more appropriate programmes for that age; the super-fast route of absorption has shut down and active efforts are more efficient. What you have lost internally has to be made up for externally. But try telling that to a teacher at that age.

We also decided that the illustrations of the Cambridge Latin Course were not good, but could be much improved if they were fitted with better captions, and we were best placed to provide them. In this unintended way our thwarted creativity found natural if disrespectful expression.

  At last a use for Messalina's

    marshmallows  suggested itself..