"My grandchildren recently asked me 'What did you do during the war years grandma'? So here's what I said.

I used to live with my grandparents and mother during the war. My grandmother, my mother's mum, was born in 1872 and was privately educated in Miss Rimmer and Miss Katie's school in Caernarfon. I had 15 years of grandma's company and she taught me lots of wisdom. 'Try not to let anyone take advantage of you' was the main thing - my only sex education in those days.

My grandfather, Hugh Owen, was a deacon and treasurer of the Methodist chapel. Money counting and banking was done by them both on the farm house kitchen table and I was allowed to watch from a distance. But as it was the Lord's money I was not allowed to touch, just watch the piles of pennies, sixpences and shillings going up in tiny rows beside a long, white paying in book.

During the war, the darkness was the worst of all. We had no electricity or gas, and paraffin had to be carried up from the shop in the hamlet. They also sold yeast for making bread and sweets which one had to have coupons for.

Mother milked the cows, the waterwheel churned the butter and there were always orders for buttermilk. Old ladies pounced on me on my way to school; 'Tell your mother I want a pound of butter'.

Mother once bought some material from the local woollen mill to make me a dress. We went through the upland village to the dressmaker's longhouse where two sisters lived, Kate and Laura Pritchard. Kate sewed and Laura farmed, milked the cows, fed the calves and supplied Kate's customers with tea and cake after each fitting session - the real treat of the whole saga for me. Apart from the cake, I hated it. Miss Kate used to command me to 'turn round, turn round' with pins in her hands and mouth and she used to pin where I could not see. I didn't like that.

Then it was out of their home in total darkness, down the lanes, mother in front with me in tow. Crash bang, my poor skin was stuck on the stone wall, blood and tears. I hate new clothes to this very day and no wonder, it was a bad experience.

The childless local vicar and his wife also had two boys to stay, named Harry and Tommy Oaks. They learned Welsh in no time, knocking on grandma's door saying 'Give us some sugar sandwiches', quite abruptly. She was not used to such demands. More than likely the pair at the vicarage had no idea of growing boys' appetites.

Grandma also let her front room to a Miss Lewis, a cook and a native of Britton Ferry, south Wales. Miss Lewis was bombed out of her place in London and not on good terms with her family, though her niece, Mrs Blake, did come to visit from London. They spoke no Welsh.

When on her own in the long winter evenings, Miss Lewis would ask me to a meal with her. No water was allowed with the meal. Games followed, like 'hide the penny'. So as not to cheat, my head was covered with a newspaper, but Miss Lewis let off lots of wind. I would follow the trail and find the penny and be given one or two wine gums as a prize.

Christmas came. Mother never gave me a reason to wait for Santa Claus - she said he was non-existent, and that was it. She'd had such a shock at eight years of age when told by a manservant it was a myth that she didn't let me believe in him.

But Miss Lewis said to me there was a Santa and I had to be in bed early. I went but could not sleep. Up and down they came. Miss Lewis, like all cooks, was heavy - you could hear her far away, struggling up the stairs.

When I woke up handmade gifts by Mr Blake were in a pillowcase beside my bed, including a soft toy monkey with red trousers and a small pipe. I had him for years.

On her seventh birthday, Mrs Blake was given a German-made doll, all smartly dressed in purple velvet. On my seventh birthday she gave it to me - it's a family heirloom today.

The German prisoners came to work on the farms from the camps nearby. Grandpa was very glad of some help on the farm. Our hand, Max Schwarz, could speak very little English and neither could we, being Welsh speakers and thinkers.

On Max's birthday on May 22 grandma made pancakes. He was happy to have the treat with butter and lemon and jam.

Max came to see us 40 years on and said 'in Mr Owen's words, I'm as weak as a cat'. It's what my grandpa used to say - it's an old Welsh saying and Max still remembered it.

We had to go to chapel three times on a Sunday, walking there and back, and were given tea by kind friends. We had to learn verses and hymns and look up to our elders. Max asked me once what we learnt, how could I explain about the Mount of Olives to him in my English? But I did remember a little poem in Welsh. Grandma would not have the words 'shit or vomit' spoken in her house - there were better ones than those in Welsh. One would not dare say 'shit', but Max was eager to hear about religion. So I taught him a Welsh poem that translated comes to 'Dog shit, cat shit, pig shit - all the same'.

But of all the people he could have recited it to, Max went to grandma!

Dear me, I cannot remember the consequences, but Max recited it in perfect Welsh to us all 40 years hence."