Marillion Fandom

Yet another thread on how long people have been marillion fans on the Marillion Official Forum, prompted me to blog my Marillion fan story;

1985 (I think) get presented with MC, Fugazi, Script. Go out and initially buy the Market Square Hero 12". I loved it all especially GRENDEL!!!!
1986 - Turn down the chance of going to see the MC tour. What a frickin numpty :oops:
1987 - buy Clutching At Straws on day of release.
1988 - mourn the loss of Fish! It's over!
1989 - Somehow hear that Marillion are to release a new LP. Swear a bit but hear the single. Not particularly impressed. Who's Steve Hogarth? The voice is too rich for my tastes then. But After Me captures my romantic side and it was the Summer of Love. Buy the CD; think that it's ok, but Marillion are over. :lol: Classic!
Loads of people with sense go to see Marillion live and have a great time, then follow the band, naturally. I end up listening to any old bollox and lose my classic rock sense.
1991 - I buy HiE on cassette (PhuckWit) This is on the strength of the single, notably The Party. No-One Can becomes a song I associate with my fiancee at the time.
1992 - No-One Can becomes an ironic stab in the heart as things change in my life. Friend hands me Generation Terrorist by the Manics and my music taste changes once again.
1995 - I see a 99p CD single from Marillion with a strange cover (from Brave). This makes me buy the album Brave and it moves me like no other. What do I do? Not a lot. i was not a great fan of live music (dont snigger at the back, it's true).
The next few years get sketchy, but I end up gettin the net and signing up for the Marillion newsletter. I get to hear about .com and very nearly send a picture.
I hear a free MP3 of 21st century and get pleasantly surprised that it's a departure but still Marillion at the core.
The Anorak spec ed had passed me by.
Then, thanks Lucy! The remasters get released. The first four albums were always favourites of mine despite the change in music taste to the Manics, Grunge and "rave" - well, The Shamen. SE over the years had become a favourite too, along with HiE. So I buy the remasters. I bought Brave too because I it was another album that stood out for me, and was played a lot.
I bought .com on the cheap, played it didn't like it. The same with Radiation. if I saw a Marillion album cheap i'd buy it but I really wasn't ready.
FFW to Autumn 2003, I get the newsletter about a 2-CD set that we can pay for in advance. Why the heck I thought this would be a good thing to do, given my ambivalence towards the band I don't know. Call it fate, i guess. So, I'm in.
I joined the Web for the free CD. I liked the mags so felt that I should join the Forum online, to see what Marillion fans are really like.
2004 - Marbles drops on the mat. First disc goes in. invisible Man starts up, and...God, is this it? Wasn't sold. Yet, I loved the rest.
it spurred me on to going to the Birmingham HMV signing. I met some fellow fans and from then on my world changed for the better. i joined the FRC and went to the social (soundcheck) and Web warm up show. I met some great friends through all this and decided to go to the convention in 2005. Meanwhile i was collecting all the Marillion material I could, that I didn't already have. You see, I had learned to appreciate the quality of H's voice. Invisible Man became one of my favourite live tracks because of the passion that H brings t the performance.
So, all in all, I've only really been a "proper" fan for about 5 years, yet a fan for about 24 years.