Those were the days, my friend/We thought they'd never end

As I haven't been serious in... well, I'm never serious on this blog, it defeats the mere object of my existence, but anyway, there's a time and a place, and this, as the Michael Jackson song somewhat ostentatiously puts it, is it.

Yesterday, someone I knew a long time ago, at school, died. Last year, days after I'd got engaged, and while I was wrapped up in my own little bubble of self-satisfaction, someone else I knew from school, from the same group of friends, also died. I felt on both occasions somewhat unworthy of feeling any sort of grief - guilty for not having kept in touch other than through the odd Facebook message and occasional running into each other at a mutual friend's party; a fear of being swept into a drama of something in which I had no part to play except perhaps a fleeting cameo. Then I found a photograph from ten years ago, and I cried my eyes out.

So here's the cameo. What this has made me realise is how the ripples of someone's life can have such a huge impact on so many people. Yesterday loads upon loads of people who knew Will posted comments on his Facebook page, ranging from heartbreaking to the frankly ridiculous. All of those people knew him; a normal, nice bloke, he'd made an impact on every single one.

I realised when I looked at that picture - which I'll come to in a minute - that in an odd and not wholly melodramatic way I owe my existence to those two guys. This isn't for some deeply symbolic reason; I never dated either (though I may have wanted to, but that's another story), and neither of them talked me down off a bridge or pushed me out of the way of an oncoming car. Nothing like that. It's just that they were there.

I fell into my sixth form days battered and bruised and brimming with teenage angst that would make Morrissey blush. I'd left a small island, much of my family, my lack of real friends (bar one or two) and a miserable few years at an all-girls secondary school I hated, and arrived on this huge, shining campus with its own golf course populated by malevolent, designer-clad youths who screamed with laughter at any hint of a Northern accent, or if you hadn't heard of Armani, who innocuously asked you the price of your ball dress knowing full well it came off the peg in Marks while theirs was - ahem - Prada. It was a mix of those who were very, very good at things - the Sports and Arts scholars, the Chinese academics, the National Youth Orchestra Violinists - those who had been told they were very, very good at things, and those who didn't need to be good at anything, because Daddy was paying and would pay until he died and passed on the inheritance. And in the midst of this 3 lovely normal guys and one loveable intellectual, all a full year above me, scooped me up andindulged me for a whole year. This was the best year of my life.

I realise now how much I owe to all of them, not least because one of them is now one of my closest friends. These beautiful blokes' blokes danced with me at the school ball; they came to my concerts. Guys who hung out together on epic treks (they did the Ten Tors challenge and talked of joining the army - and did) listened to me babble on about saving the world, socialism, and my "band" (Lapsang - 'nuff said), and gently took the piss out of my vegetarianism, misguided attempts at Marxism, and the undercover relationship everyone was convinced I was having with the budding author in our group. While the School's elite and the resident tormenters bore down on you from the Rep Step and skulked around the quad, we occupied our very own table... in the library. We talked about The Now Show, and we plotted against the new headmaster, a chap who made us laugh so much it hurt when he condemned his students for "unseemly displays of affection" and told us he didn't like to think of our new outfits as a uniform, rather "a dress code with compulsory elements". We were the Resistance, our own brand of revolutionaries. Only we really knew what was going on. I have it on record. Dom, in my leaver's book, wrote "I hope you survive another year of Mr P and all the other cronies plotting against the school. Good luck in your crusades about whatever the next peaceful demonstration is about. Anyway, have fun."

And I did have fun. I had so much fun. This was truly the best year of my life. For the first time I can remember, I felt challenged, wanted, cajoled, supported - I felt happy. When they left I was able to stand a little taller, feel a bit more confident. I got on with stuff, though stuff was never that good again.

And I found the picture. On their last day of school before A level study leave, with me, their token girl and protegee looking on in giggles, a giant pink bedsheet appeared hung from a window high up in the theatre, and on it massive letters for all to see, some reference, I presume, to our Head/Dictator, as we saw it: "Cheer up, the worst is yet to come. From the class of '99".

Cheer up, the worst is yet to come.

There were five of us. Now, disparate and floundering, there are three. Will and Dom - I now realise how much I owe to you both. I love you and I miss you. Thank you.