Graham Taylor – More Than a Customer
Every journey must begin somewhere, and I can think of no better place to start than with Graham Taylor.
When I took over the fish round from Brian Simons, I inherited much more than a list of streets and customers. Brian had built relationships with people over many years, and I knew that some familiar and well-known faces might eventually appear at my fish van.
One name had been mentioned to me: Graham Taylor.
I knew that sooner or later he might turn up. Even so, knowing that something may happen and being prepared for the moment when it actually does are two entirely different things.
At the time, I had a regular fish stand in Four Oaks, Sutton Coldfield. Customers would gather around, wait their turn and buy their fish directly from the van. It was busy, friendly and informal, and I treated everyone in exactly the same way.
Then one day, as I looked along the queue, I saw him.
Graham Taylor was standing there patiently among all the other customers, waiting his turn to buy some fish.
I remember looking again to make sure my eyes weren’t deceiving me.
“Oh my God,” I thought. “It’s Graham Taylor.”
This was the former England manager, the man whose face had appeared on television screens and in newspapers across the country. He had managed Watford and Aston Villa and had held one of the most scrutinised jobs in English sport.
And there he was, standing in my queue as though there was nothing remotely unusual about it.
As far as Graham was concerned, there probably wasn’t.
He wasn’t pushing to the front. He wasn’t demanding special treatment or expecting anyone to fuss over him. He was simply waiting with everyone else for his turn to buy some fish.
When he reached the front, he held out his hand.
“Now then, Jim,” he said. “I’ve heard all about you. I’m Graham.”
I shook his hand, but I must admit that for a few moments I didn’t quite know what to say.
All the professionalism I had built up seemed to disappear. I was trying desperately to treat him like any other customer, but inside I was thinking, “This is Graham Taylor standing in front of me.”
I was a little starstruck. In fact, I think my whole body may have been shaking. I had sold fish to hundreds of people, but this was the first time I had found myself face-to-face with somebody so famous.
It was a surreal moment.
Of course, Graham made it easy. He didn’t arrive as “the former England manager.” He introduced himself simply as Graham, and that was how he remained throughout all the years I knew him.
That first meeting was the beginning of something I could never have predicted.
Over time, Graham and his wife Rita became regular customers. I would call at their home with their fish, and if Graham happened to miss me, he was not above chasing me across Sutton Coldfield to find out where I had gone.
There was never any sense that I should be the one chasing after him because of who he was. He wanted his fish, and if that meant tracking down my van somewhere along the route, that was exactly what he would do.
Gradually, the nerves disappeared.
The extraordinary became ordinary.
The famous football manager became Graham, my customer and, eventually, my friend.
We talked about football, naturally, but we also talked about our families and whatever else happened to be going on in our lives. He would ask how things were with me, and I would ask how he and Rita were getting on.
Graham always retained a great affection for Grimsby.
He had played for Grimsby Town during the 1960s before moving to Lincoln City, where his playing career ended and his managerial career began. He had also started his footballing life as an apprentice with Scunthorpe United, so his links with northern Lincolnshire ran deep.
He often spoke fondly about his time in Grimsby, and I remember him mentioning that his daughters had been born in the town. Those connections mattered to him. Grimsby was not simply another football club on a long list of appointments. It had been a significant part of his life and his family’s story.
For me, as a lifelong Grimsby Town supporter, those conversations were naturally very special.
I have a book featuring one hundred Grimsby Town players from the past and present. My long-standing school friend, Andrew Shearsmith, and his father, David, also had copies.
David had been involved in football as a referee and had collected a good number of autographs from Grimsby Town players over the years. I told David and Andrew that I could ask Graham to sign their books for them.
By that stage, asking Graham for an autograph didn’t feel like approaching a distant celebrity. It felt like asking a friend to do me a favour.
True to form, Graham signed them.
It was a small act, perhaps, but it meant a great deal to David and Andrew, and it demonstrated the generosity I had come to expect from him.
Then came an evening I will never forget.
Graham and Rita were due to attend an event at Grimsby Town Football Club, where they would talk about football, their memories and the good old days.
I attended with Andrew and David Shearsmith.
Andrew and I had been friends since our school days. Together, we had followed Grimsby Town through the highs, the lows and all the many experiences that come with supporting your hometown club. On this particular evening, however, we were simply three supporters sitting in a room filled with other supporters, club officials and invited guests.
In that room, I was nobody important. I was just another man with a ticket.
When Graham and Rita entered, they were immediately surrounded by the important people at the club. Officials, dignitaries and guests gathered around them, all eager to speak to the famous former England manager and his wife.
That was exactly what you would expect to happen.
Then Rita looked across the room and spotted me.
Without hesitation, she left the group and came straight across.
She threw her arms around me, gave me a kiss and greeted me warmly.
“Hiya, Jim! How are you? It’s lovely to be here.”
For a moment, I don’t think David or Andrew could quite believe what they were seeing.
Then Graham noticed what was happening.
He left the group of important people and made his way across the room to join us. He greeted me warmly, gave me a hug and shook my hand.
I introduced him to Andrew and David as naturally as I would introduce one friend to another.
“This is Andy, my old school friend, and this is his dad, David.”
I was simply talking to Graham and Rita as I always did. To me, by then, it felt normal.
For David and Andrew, it was anything but normal.
They were completely in awe of the welcome we were receiving.
The reaction around the room was priceless.
You could almost see people looking around and wondering:
“Where has Graham gone?”
“Who is he talking to?”
“Who on earth are those people?”
Only moments earlier, we had been three ordinary supporters sitting quietly at a table. Suddenly, we had the sort of personal attention that almost everyone else in the room would have loved to receive.
The difference was simple.
The other people in the room knew who Graham Taylor was.
I actually knew Graham and Rita.
That evening, Graham kept returning to our table. He sat with us, talked with us and shared a drink. For much of the night, it felt as though he wasn’t particularly concerned about impressing the officials or circulating among the important guests.
He seemed perfectly happy spending his time with us.
It was a wonderful feeling.
There was no pretence involved and no attempt on my part to appear important. I wasn’t important, and neither were Andrew or David. But for that evening, through our friendship with Graham and Rita, we were made to feel incredibly special.
It remains one of those moments I could never have imagined experiencing when I first took over a fish round.
Eventually, Graham and Rita moved away from Sutton Coldfield to Kings Langley in Hertfordshire, closer to London. I only managed to see them there a couple of times. Graham remained in Kings Langley until his death in January 2017.
By then, I had created a photograph of Graham and me standing at the back of my fish van. Because photography had become an important part of my life, I had used Photoshop to place the badges of the football clubs connected with Graham beneath the picture.
I intended to ask him to sign it.
Unfortunately, I had made a mistake with one of the dates on the image. It needed correcting before I could give it to him, and somehow the opportunity slipped away.
He never did sign it.
It is one of those small regrets that stays with you. At the time, you assume there will always be another visit, another conversation and another chance to put something right.
Then one day, there isn’t.
I received a telephone call from a close friend and customer in Sutton Coldfield.
He told me that Graham had died.
At first, I genuinely thought he was winding me up.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “That isn’t funny.”
I simply couldn’t accept that it could be true.
But it was.
Graham Taylor had died suddenly on 12 January 2017, aged seventy-two.
The news affected me in a way I had never experienced before.
It was the first time in my life that I had felt grief for the loss of a friend in the same way that I would have grieved for a member of my own family.
That was when I fully understood what our relationship had become.
Graham had not simply been a famous man who once bought fish from me.
He wasn’t merely a name I could drop into conversation or a photograph I could show people.
Over the years, through all those doorstep conversations, jokes, football discussions and enquiries about each other’s families, he had become my friend.
We were pals.
That is something I will always regard as enormously precious.
When people hear that I sold fish to Graham Taylor, they often naturally think of the former England manager. They think of Watford, Aston Villa, Grimsby Town and his long career in football.
I remember those things too, of course.
But I also remember the man patiently waiting in my queue in Four Oaks.
I remember him holding out his hand and saying, “I’m Graham.”
I remember him chasing my van around Sutton Coldfield when he had missed his delivery.
I remember the conversations about Grimsby, football and family.
I remember Rita spotting me across a crowded room and running over to embrace me.
I remember Graham leaving all the important people behind to come and sit with three ordinary Grimsby Town supporters.
Most of all, I remember how he made us feel.
I still have a book containing a personal message that Graham wrote for me. I also have the photographs and the memories, many of which I hope to share alongside this story.
But what I value most cannot be placed in a frame or written inside a book.
It is the knowledge that somewhere along the way, a relationship that began with a man queuing to buy fish became a genuine friendship.
People may ask me what it was like to meet the celebrities and well-known figures who appeared on my round over the years.
The truth is, I never set out to collect famous names.
I simply turned up every week with a van full of fresh Grimsby fish.
The fish opened the door, but it was the conversations, the laughter, the kindness and the friendships that made the journey worthwhile.
Graham Taylor was one of the first people to make me realise just how special that journey was becoming.
And that is why there could be no better person with whom to begin.
Graham Taylor’s personal inscription inside my copy of Mariner Men.
