Shattered illusions when you were very little?

JudyPark wild frontier! That is hilarious!!!

Brilliant Kim19 I thought it was only me !

For many years I thought I was singing a nonsense song which went something like 'Mairsie dotes and Dosey dotes and little Amsy tyvie. A tiddley ivy too wouldn't you'. Actual words 'Mares eat oats and Does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy. A kid will eat ivy too. Wouldn't you'. I would be so embarrassed to tell you how mature I was before I discovered this.

I always wondered what people meant when they said 'sleeping policeman' - daft little me expected to see a long elongated policeman laying along the centre of the road!

I remember my friend finding a packet of Lillets in her much older sisters room. We took them out of the packet and squeezed them between our toes

We were horrified when her sister explained what they were actually for and couldn't believe we had been in the front garden "wearing" them.

Grandma70s I also wanted to buy Sanitary Towels, they sounded so much better than the wet roller towel in public loos.
I was always bewildered by the sign “reduced to clear” and wanted to know how much “clear” was.

I’ve just remembered that when I was about eight or nine I went to a ballet matinee with my mother and in the interval we went to the Ladies. There was a slot machine for “Sanitary towels”. I thought they would be some specially hygienic towel for drying our hands, and begged my mother to get us some. She hedged for some reason - quite a few people were listening - but I kept on asking. I thought it would be really nice, and anyway I liked using slot machines.. My poor mother was very embarrassed, and of course I had no idea why. I think she finally said she would explain when we got home, and I eventually shut up.

Hymns again: not a personal misunderstanding but one I heard on the radio-my favourite is, "There is a Green Hill Farnham Way"

My mother described any male passer by on the street as "the gentleman" . That illusion was very easily shattered for me in later life of course!

I remember being shocked, aged about 12, to realise that our priests both smoked and drank! I spotted a cigarette packet in Fr. Murphy's shirt pocket!

Another hymn-related one: it was years before I found out that “There is a green hill far away without a city wall” meant that the green hill was outside a city wall. I used to think the poor green hill was for some reason deprived of a city wall.

When I was very small I thought Once in Royal meant something like “Once upon a time”. “Once upon a time David’s city...stood a lowly cattle shed”. It didn’t seem to make sense.

Then there is always “Harold be thy name” in the Lord’s Prayer. OK, I didn’t think of that one. I read it somewhere.

On a similar subject Gaggi3 my late grandad used to tell me a heartbreaking story about when he was a little boy.

From a very deprived background he and some other children were taken to a nearby church hall where a Christmas party was held for some of the poorest children. A huge Christmas tree stood in the corner covered in toys. there were trains, dolls and various other things. The children were put in a sort of queue and my grandad was first in line.

The Santa Claus asked him what he would like for christmas and never having ever had a toy, he dared to point to the train hanging on the tree and said "I would really like that train please Santa" the santa looked up to the tree and back down to the scruffy small boy and said "you are a greedy little boy and greedy boys get nothing".

He cried all the way home. his illusions of Santa well and truly smashed.

When I was about 4, 1947 so not many toys available, my mother bought a raffle ticket for a doll. It was displayed in the window of a shop. I had no idea how raffles worked and was very disappointed when I didn't get the doll, as I had assumed it was a sure thing.

I used to sing the carol Good King "Wences last" looked out on the feast of Stephen and was shocked to find out I had got it wrong for some years and it should have been "Wenceslas". (I won't say what age I was when I found out - I can't remember anyway but I don't think I was all that young!!!)

Always remember you were special as your parents chose you as you were very much wanted.x

Seeing Sea Monkeys in the pet shop window, the box was illustrated with a family of little monkey like creatures, it said when you put contents of box in water they came to life, I begged my Mum for them and was told NO, they don't look like that they are little tiny "shrimpy" looking things, I thought she was making it up so I couldn't have them, I seen them years later in water, my Mum was right?

Maw I had forgotten about Amami, but my Grandpa who lived with us bought some, so my sister and I could have waves in our hair.
I suppose it was a forerunner of today’s mousse, but it made your hair horribly sticky and was one of the many things my mother disapproved of

being told I was adopted when I was 4

I was wildly excited (aged 4) when I heard mummy tell a friend "My sister is coming for a visit". I made up endless dreams about this wonderful unknown person and was sadly disappointed when I found out the it was just Auntie S.!

I came home after one of my very first days at school and asked Mummy what the hymn "Jesus bits of shine with a poor clear light" meant. English was not my mother's first language, so I had to wait until Daddy came home for the explanation that our form mistress had been trying to teach us the hymn that begins "Jesus bids us shine with a pure, clear light, Like a little candle shining in the night.

My two disappointments were first of all seeing Buckingham Palace (which wasn’t gold with turrets) and also my grandma saying we were going to my great aunt’s house on Shanks’s Pony!

My sister, cousins and I used to sleep at grandmas while our parents went out to the "beer bar" on a Saturday night. I always thought this place must be terribly sophisticated and we used to pretend we were going out to the beer bar with grandmas shoes and handbags. I always "ordered" a Babycham (in my pretend bar) as I had seen it on TV and loved the little bambi figure and the bubbles.

So many disappointments brought to mind with this thread!
When I asked my Mum where babies came from she told me Daddy gave her a special seed. The greengrocer sold packets of seeds, so I imagined him shyly asking for a baby seed!
I was 9 when 1969 became 1970 and I was allowed to stay up till midnight. I really expected everything to feel different as we moved into a new decade. I was so disappointed! I've always wondered about the young children when we moved into the year 2000. Were they disappointed?
The biggest disappointment though was, aged 12, when something happened (can't remember what) and I realised my Mum was in the wrong. I think I'd believed she knew everything and was always right until that point and I was hurt and disappointed.

apropos hymns, the verse that to me ( amongst many) that sounded really peculiar was in ' O, worship the King'

Thy bountiful care, what tongue can recite
It breathes in the air, it shines in the light
It streams from the hills, it descends to the plain
And sweetly distils in the dew and the rain.

Now I see it all hinges on'Care' As a child, I thought the subject was 'Tongue and wondered when the miracle of this long pink tongue sneaking over and gleaming on the hills would happen

When I was old enough to stay awake to see the New Year in - I had always thought the sky moved from one side to the other bringing in the New Year - so disappointed!

Written in buses in Manchester in the 1950s was an instruction: "Tender exact fare". It puzzled me for years why the fare should be a sweet and gentle thing...