A remark made 84 years ago at ballet school still rankles. Why?

Q: When I was 12, I joined Madame Behenna’s Dancing School of Ballet, Tap and Comedy. I danced my routines with flair. After a few weeks, Madame said, “Just stick to tap and comedy, dear.” Eighty-four years on, why does this still upset me? M.F., Brighton East, Vic

A: Madame Behenna did you a huge favour. Ballet is a tough career : years of training, auditions, injuries – and if you do finally crack the big time, you’re washed up by 40, unemployed and arthritic, with loose, flabby forehead skin from overzealous head-bunning. But by encouraging you to focus on tap and comedy, Madame Behenna thoughtfully pushed you towards two dance styles that people actually use in real life: I’ve lit up many a dance floor with my nimble-footed Astaire-esque tap routine, segueing almost immediately into my drunken, comedic, flail-your-arms-in-the-air-and-try-not-to-slap-anyone-in-the-face Charleston.

But I get why you’re still hurting all these years later. Those judgmental comments in childhood can haunt you for a lifetime. A teacher telling you that you’re not smart. An auntie telling you that you need to lose weight. Peter Chalkis in year 8 telling me my breath smelt weird (and, ever since, I’ve chewed about 40 sticks of gum a day, so my breath is permanently fresh, but I have no more tooth enamel and my jaw pops when I breathe).

If it’s still haunting you, just prove Madame Behenna wrong. Slip into your old ballet shoes, yank on your childhood tutu, tug your hair and loose forehead skin into a tight bun – and get out to some ballet auditions. You may be 96, but I bet you can still plié and pirouette and swing a leg onto the barre. And if you can’t, well, it’ll make for an excellent comedy dance routine.

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