DANNY was written long-hand and runs to around 2,196,930 words across four volumes.

The shortest book is Volume 2 at 442,731 words. And the longest is Volume 3 at a combined total of 742,876 words.

However, as Volume 2 & 3 were really written as one book the original Volume 2 (as it was) is the longest at over a million words (1,185,607, to be exact).

This would be a lot of words to type (and it was) but it was a whole lot to write long-hand too.

I used to work on DANNY seven days a week and, at its height, I sometimes wrote as much as thirty-odd pages a day. I would get up late in the day, walk the three miles into Maryport and back most days, have lunch, then do dance practice 2-3 every afternoon, except Sundays.

After that I would settle down to write in the tiny upstairs bedroom which had a futon made up into a sofa each morning. I would curl up with the cat, Fleabag, and I'd often write right through till around midnight or later.

I'd often be wound-up after writing, unable to discharge the emotions of what I'd been re-enacting, so we'd go out for a walk round the village or, sometimes, down to Rose Ghyll. This was a wonderful walk down a long, very narrow lane with hedgerows and wild flowers banked at either side. It sank down into the valley that ran behind Crosby and on summer evenings was often full of odd rolling mists, floating cobwebs and bats.

We'd go down there, tired and silent or tired and animated, depending on what I had been writing, and we'd hear the animals coughing and sneezing in the fields. Sometimes we'd wake them and they'd come over to see us, strange breathing, huffing shapes lumbering towards us through the darkness. We startled them as often as they startled us.

I remember nothing that was said in all the walking we did in Crosby - probably roughly the circumference of the globe - but I do remember a neighbour of ours, who we (affectionately) named Crosby Fiendish, saying she always saw us walking along the road talking nineteen to the dozen.

Almost fifteen years later the lady who cleans up in our favourite Burger King comments on how we are always "deep in conversation".

Guess I'm just naturally long-winded.

Anyway, here is the evidence of just how much I love the sound of my own voice, or at least the voices of my characters. I have included the original first pages of all the books, including the original , original first page of DANNY, now deleted.

These images will show you just how scruffy original manuscripts look and just how far one human being's handwriting can deteriorate.

Mine's virtually became hieroglyphics in the course of writing DANNY. So much so, that years later I seriously began to worry about my ability to read Volume 4 and began to fear that it might be lost for all eternity.

I, and it, was saved by Gillian, my revered typist, who I found on Orkney (bless the day).

Gillian was a family archive historian and was used to deciphering ancient hand-written documents often in bad English and deteriorated with age. She worked (and is still working currently) very hard on translating DANNY (2 - 4) page by page into the readable manuscripts I have today.

I typed all of Volume 1 up myself. It took me a year, working on it religiously every day on an old Canon WordStar. I also typed about a third (I think) of Volume 2 and a little of 3. Of 4 I had nothing. What's more, I couldn't face typing any more of it. So without Gillian and her Alien Handwriting Decoding Skills DANNY may never have seen the light of day.

I hope you enjoy seeing How It Was Done. And, please, please don't try this at home. A PC is best.

P.S. Except, of course, a pen between you and the page is the finest, sweetest link to God ever yet made. My heart to your heart with barely a breath between us. Sigh...