Many people can be found guilty of trying to be something they clearly are not. There was much ribald humour when Lord Wedgewood Benn, unhappy with his aristocratic lineage, made it known he preferred to be known as plain Tony Benn.

He was pictured holding a working man’s mug of tea. Many ‘socialists’ are adept at disguising their expensive upper-class public school backgrounds.

It works both ways; many going through life in steerage strive to go in what they perceive to be an upward direction. I recall a couple of working-class glaziers. Having won the national lottery the pair took themselves, their wives and sprogs off to one of those exotic Caribbean islets the stinking rich prefer us not to know about.

For them, it was not a happy experience. Their stay was spoiled by an offensive social apartheid that left them in no doubt they were regarded as nouveau riche working class riff raff behaving above their station.

As a young man, I dated a very posh public school-educated debutante.  Maria’s glossy magazine model career began as a Pears Calendar child.

I once told her I was sweating. She pulled me up on that one. ‘No Michael; horses sweat, men perspire, but we ladies just feel the heat.’

She also taught me to say ‘may I have’ when asking for something rather than ‘can I have.’ There is a difference and it taught me a lesson.

Don’t try to be something you are not; a single word or expression will hole your social status below the waterline. Just be yourself and you will be better thought of. Ask Ludwig van Beethoven; a grumpy working-class Rhinelander was feted throughout the palaces of the Habsburg Empire, and so was Joseph Hayden the won of a hard-working wheelwright.

Many successful people never allow their achievement, their power or their wealth to change their nature or their background. Pam Morgan of Redrow Homes, the house-building empire insisted on her chauffeur’s admission to the inner warmth of black-tie venues rather than wait in the car. Other attendees were aghast at her proletarian behaviour. Goodness me: Whatever next?

To me, Alan Whicker, journalist and broadcaster epitomised the classless Briton. This amiable conversationalist had the gift of being able to chat as gently with princes as with the road sweeper outside.

Broadcaster Terry Wogan; and fellow Irishmen Eamonn Andrews and Henry Kelly, had similar qualities as did Michael Parkinson the British television presenter.

Eve Peron was the wife of Argentine right-wing dictator Juan Peron but ‘the shirtless ones’ adored her empathy with their humble situation.

The Managing Director of the Bowater’s Shipping Company, a fleet built specifically to service the UK’s insatiable appetite for newsprint, often joined us in the ship’s mess.

Much the same could be said of Captain Inez, Spanish-born commodore of Palm Lines shipping fleet. It is a quirk of human nature that the only people who talk big are the little people.

Talking of ships, I have never forgotten spending a little time in the company of a boss of a multinational corporation. As we chatted, I mentioned in passing that the only arrogant heads-up-their-ass bosses I ever met were one or two-man shitty little outfits lost in some industrial estate or the like.

The Chief Executive Officer of Mann International smiled: “When you are an achiever you don’t have to prove anything to anyone.”

When on the Costa del Sol I accompanied Inge Rinkhoff, it occurred to me that this elegant German TV producer and glamorous luminary of Marbella society had the touch of Eve Peron about her. Popular she never sees distinction; only people and when greeting her people see only Inge ~ MICHAEL WALSH AWARD WINNING WRITER: PLEASE SHARE OUR STORY ON SOCIAL MEDIA.

THE ENIGMA OF TIFFANY Michael Walsh Award-Winning International Writer. Working-Class or Upper-Class. Who was Tiffany? A tender romantic comedy plus many risque bits that focus on the amorous friendship of Gareth and his attractive lady friends.  A reader writes, ‘I thoroughly enjoyed it.’ There is girl talk, excitement, revelations, dilemmas, compromises, romance, and pathos.

LINK TO BOOK    https://tinyurl.com/52nmpnjz