Highs and lows of superfandom have hopelessly irresistible allure

I can still remember the feeling of having a huge crush on a celebrity in my younger days: that all-encompassing, overwhelming adulation for a personality so far removed from one’s own life - and so hopelessly alluring.

It’s a sensation at once both ebullient and deflating: the sheer thrill of occupying the same corner of the universe at the same time as the object of one’s fascination; the devastating awareness that you will most likely never meet.

Stark reality is never sufficiently potent to douse the ardent flames of hero-worship, however, and obsessions rage on unabated.

Nowadays, in common parlance, this phenomenon would be known as Superfandom. In those halcyon days of youth, the flames of my fanatical fire were fanned (if you'll excuse the pun) by teen-friendly magazines, which frequently featured tidbits of information about the brightest stars of the day.

Occasionally, there would be the transcript of an actual interview over which I would pore in rapt fascination, desperate to devour every insignificant detail and determined to commit the most miniscule particle of information to memory.

I would emerge breathlessly from this deep dive sometime later, in the sure and certain (and utterly misguided) knowledge that I now knew my hero inside out.

Pages of these preppy periodicals were regularly peppered with winsome photos of top celebs in appealing poses, inclusions which brought joy to my heart.

Rarely - but wonderfully - magazines would boast the ultimate accolade: a full-page poster that could be extracted from the publication and lovingly fastened to my bedroom wall, from which loft vantage point the faces of my heartthrob idols would gaze down upon me like an eclectic band of fashionista angels in stances of well-coiffed intensity.

My bliss knew no bounds when a picture such as this was given pride of place across the double centre pages of the magazine; a careful hand was required to ease the poster painstakingly from its stapled clasp and ensure that the least possible damage was inflicted upon the precious image.

It was a sad day indeed if the photographer had captured a pose which inadvertently dictated that a protagonist’s face was neatly fissured by the staple’s cruel prongs. These days, although I am aware that the periodicals industry is still healthy, it seems - unsurprisingly - that the sources of information most often consulted to ignite the embers of hero-worship are to be found online: the internet has spawned an endless supply of (often unfiltered) detail about anyone in whom there is the least vestige of interest.

My young son, whose allegiance has shifted recently from one pop superstar to another, is perfectly primed to absorb these fathomless minutiae - and he’s not afraid to share his expertise, either.

During his half-term break, on an unexpectedly pleasant afternoon, said son and I kitted out Miss Pup in her harness, snapped on her lead, and set off from the house to take her for a walk.

Eschewing the chance to amble alongside his fond mother, my son had elected to travel by scooter, taking advantage of the slightest of gradients to zip past the dog and me in a surfeit of joy.

Miss Pup, whose own speedy proclivities were thankfully being curtailed by the essential anti-pull device fastened about her nose, was initially most perturbed by this behaviour, particularly when my son retraced his steps - or rather, scoots - to relive an especially glorious streak; concerned, she would come to a halt and insist upon waiting for him, only resuming her tail-wagging trot when he was ahead of her once more.

Despite being thus happily engaged, my son considered our excursion to be the optimum opportunity to continue to educate me - to a limited degree - on his new idol, a certain Ms Taylor Swift, and set about furnishing me with fun facts about this illustrious artist.

The first piece of knowledge he had imparted earlier in the day - the ludicrously lengthy name used to identify a specific recording of a music track - I had been obliged to learn by rote, solely by initials to begin with (the delivery of which he, naturally, executed with impressive and consummate ease), and, once I had mastered that tricky abbreviation, by the full words.

So exacting were his efforts that I was able to repeat each task flawlessly (albeit hesitantly) within minutes. I smugly demonstrated my powers of recall as we strolled the streets; clearly, that information had lodged itself into the deepest recesses of my brain - though nothing else seemed to penetrate, as I am struggling to remember what else my son taught me on our walk. Nevertheless, I am (somewhat disproportionately) proud to reveal that, more than a week later, I am still able to recall the title in its abbreviated entirety - and will readily divulge it: ATWTMVTVFTVSGAVRALPS. And if you can work that out - or, indeed, already know it - then congratulations, my friend: you are a Superfan, too.