Maths revision.  The Young Ones (with Cliff of course) got to the UK number 1 spot with Living Doll.  As I had bought the single in the period immediately prior to this momentous event, I felt more than a little bit chuffed with myself.  Lol!

We got tons of holiday homework for Chemistry in this the week of Good Friday.  Maths, was I reported, 'depressing' and I even attampted to learn some of my 50 French questions and answers for the exam. That was 'bl***y hard'.  I went to bed at 10pm.

So, now we're getting to the end of the 80's.  Is there a detectable decline in the music standards?  Oh, I certainly think so, look at who's the number 1 UK single at the beginning of 1989.  Bland, safe, boring, soulless, a TV tie-in... eurgh!

But then look which single follows Jason and Kylie to the number 1 spot.  One of the all time greats, and a stalwart of 1980's music, Marc Almond.  But later in the year, Jason makes it back to the top, as does Sonia, and as does the truly awful Jive Bunny and The Mastermixers.  Not once, but three time!  As Tome Baker would surely say, Britain, Britian, Britain??!!

But the accolade, UK top single of the year, (and one of the UK top singles ever!) belongs, in my humble opinion to Soul II Soul and Caron Wheeler with Back to Life (However Do You Want Me).  Quite simply stunning.  Just don't mention that rabbit!

Ooh wow!  There certainly were some great UK number 1 records in 1988.  Perhaps my favourite is Fairground Attraction's Perfect.  It's got to be-e-e-e Perfect.  Simply breathtaking really.  The stomping, anthemic Heaven Is A Place On Earth from Belinda Carlilse was a carry over from Christmas 1987.

Perennial wedding favourite (well it's been played at any wedding that I've been to since 1988), and a song that Dads the UK over get up and shake their funky stuff to, The Only Way Is Up, by Yazz and The Plastic Population was a UK number 1 from 1988.

1987's Christmas number 1 was the Pet Shop Boys' cover of the Elvis song, You Were Always On My Mind.  I well remember dancing to this in a great huddle at a Christmas Disco. Well didn't everybody?  In my opinion, Elvis's version wasn't quite such the driving force of Neil and Chris's version.  Continuing a recent theme - remember Jackie Wilson's Reet Petite - Ben E. King's classic Stand By Me was re-released in 87 and made it to number 1.

Looking back to 1987, perhaps Rick Astley - he of the Stock Aitken Waterman conveyor belt - was a better singer than I certainly gave him credit for. Never Gonna Give You Up is a pop classic.  One of those 1980's songs that will stand the test of time.

There were some cracking number ones in 1986.  Pet Shop Boys debut, West End Girls is a modern classic it has to be said.  So too is The Housemartins', Caravan of Love.  But, that's not to say that everything in the garden was rosy, oh no.  For a kick off, in this year we had the turgid Lady in Red by the toe curling Chris De Burgh.  And even worse, for at least Chris is a musician, we also saw Nick Berry, Nick Berry! going to number one with Every Loser wins. Pfft!!!

N-n-n-nineteen.  You must remember this. One of the classic 1980's songs. Paul Hardcastle probably hasn't done an awful lot since this, well not that I like! In the time immediately before we bought a video recorder, we had a television unit that had a turntable and a tape recorder attached.  So of course instead of just taping off the radio (was it really illegal?) we could also tape the sound off the TV. So we did and this track was definitely one of our favourites.  We also taped one of the Young Ones epidsodes - the University Challenge one, and I can (and do) still bore people with quotes from it!

Top UK number 1 from 1985 must be The Eurythmics' There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart). A real up tempo, summer hit, it's immortalised by having Stevie Wonder's harmonica playing on it.  The Christmas number one, from Shakin' Stevens was a blast too!

There were some excellent UK number 1's in 1984.  And due to their quality, they stayed up there for longer. Hence there weren't so many of them - a real case of quality not quantity.

There were 3 Wham! UK number ones. George Michael certainly had the knack of penning the perfect pop song, and of these three, perhaps Wake Me Up Before You Go Go is his most catchy.  Freedom will prove to be the most covered, but for sheer exuberance Wake Me Up... is da one!

Frankie Goes To Hollywood managed to match Wham!'s total score. They started with Relax - perhaps the most controversial of all the 1980's songs. Or perhaps not.  They certainly turned up the heat with Two Tribes, tapping in to the paranoia surrounding the impending nuclear war which still hasn't happened... yet.  But then coming up towards Christmas, they socked us straight between the eyes with The Power Of Love.  Marvelous and perhaps a truer refection of their abilities to find the public's pulse.

1983. The year of the Falklands, the year of Michael Foot's disastrous General Election campaign. The year of an a-capella UK number 1 Christmas single. It's a great song anyway, Yazoo took it to number 2 in 1982, but the Flying Pickets managed to take it a step further. I can still remember hearing it for the first time, it was on Wogan, on the telly!

Down Under by Men At Work is one of those great 1980's songs. I didn't buy it at the time, but I did manage to pick it up later on Brazilian import, a 7inch singe still, but on 33rpm not the UK chart sings standard of 45rmp. There were some other fantastic UK number 1 records in '83 too. Phil Collins produced perhaps his best work with his cover of The Supremes' You Can't Hurry Love. Does anyone else remember the video. I was convinced for ages that Phil was one of twins... OK, I'll get me coat.

We are really going back in time here... 1982. My pre-teen days, gulp. But I still like to think that I knew a good song (or a bad song) when I heard one. Bucks Fizz, remember them, had won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1981 and they were atsride the UK singles chart for a couple of years afterwards. This year, they had two number 1 UK singles.

Alongside the kitsch of Buzks Fizz, we had the European electro-pop of Kraftwerk with The Model. We also had the 80's original angry young men in The Jam scoring two number 1 records. There was also Captain Sensible's piece of irreverent nonsense with Happy Talk from Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific. Does the Captain say the C word? In my youthful innocence (is that the word?) I certainly thought that he did, but surely Mike Read would have spotted it it if he had?

Where to begin? I guess that the flavour for the early part of 1981 in terms of UK chart singles was set on 8 December 1980 with the death of John Lennon. Two of his singles, the searching Imagine and the paean to love, Woman were released posthumously and saw Lennon on top of the UK chart until 21 February 1981.

Lennon was replaced by Australian Joe Dolce with his dreadful Shaddap You Face. Dolce, who famously / infamously / boringly kept Ultravox's Vienna off the top spot, staying there until 14 March, when another John Lennon song - Jealous Guy - this time sung by Roxy Music knocked him off the number one spot.

The rest of the UK number 1 records in '81 were a cracking bunch.  We saw Adam & The Ants sit proudly atop the charts with both Stand & Deliver and Prince Charming.  The Specials' Ghost Town took its place at the top and finally the number 1 Christmas single was Don't You Want Me by The Human League.  1981 was a good year for UK hit singles.