BLAISE TAPP: Early Doors recalls the warmth and generosity of the pub community

This week, we are told, is the grimmest of the year - a time when we realise that every last piece of chocolate in the house has finally been eaten and that we will, in more ways than one, be paying for the festive fun until the summer.

Even if you are unmoved by the PR-driven Blue Monday narrative, lousy weather and dark, long nights mean that many of us have sought a variety of ways to avoid the seasonal gloom. I haven’t had to try too hard, following the BBC’s decision to finally rerun the brilliant sitcom, Early Doors, a 21st Century classic, that is set in an unremarkable Greater Manchester pub.

Over the coming weeks, wise old Auntie will continue to broadcast two episodes on BBC4 every Saturday night, and they will also sit on the iPlayer. Even though I was a fan of the show the first time around 20 years ago, its long overdue reintroduction to British culture has brought some welcome sunshine to the Tapp household this week.

An hour of being reacquainted with the humdrum lives of Ken, the loveable but slightly dodgy landlord, and his ragtag bunch of regulars such as professional misery guts Tommy, best mates Joe and Duffy and oddball couple Joan and Eddie, elicited belly laughs and broad smiles after a particularly tricky day.

In my opinion, I can’t think of a series funnier than this one in the last two decades and I implore anybody that hasn’t seen it before to seek it out because each episode is 30 beautifully crafted minutes of gentle, yet side splitting comedy.

For its relatively small, but fiercely loyal, army of fans, Early Doors has long been regarded as the most underrated of television comedies, with its appeal coming from the fact that, crooked coppers aside, we instantly recognise the characters from the show. Anybody who has ever stepped foot in a local will relate with being bored to tears by inane chat about roadworks and temporary traffic lights, even if they were not necessarily on Birdhall Lane.

They will also have encountered more than one curmudgeonly old timer who nurses his pint for hours on end and consistently refuses well meaning offers of a drink from fellow regulars for fear of being drawn into a needlessly expensive round scenario. I’ve frequented numerous boozers where longstanding regulars have been honoured with a plaque next to ‘their’ space and woe betide anyone who dares to sit there.

I can recall an uncomfortable standoff in a regular haunt of mine between a local of 50 years who, quite literally, stood on the heels of an unsuspecting visitor who was perched on ‘his’ stool until he was convinced to move by the embarrassed guvnor.