The 1990s, In its heyday it brought us Brit-pop, Britney Spears, New Labour, The Spice Girls; and it saw the birth of Channel Five.

Not a lot then, no.

Before Mobile phones took off, prior to Twitter, and Facebook - keeping in contact meant leaving messages on answering machines, and keeping on time (hurrah, that with the advent of technology with have far more ways to forget, be late, and detach ourselves from each other.)

This Life was first broadcast on BBC Two on 18 March 1996, it featured a group of five lawyers in their twenties. It ended up defining a generation of Twenty - somethings, (whom are now in their Mid - Thirties, as of 2009).

This was not ‘Friends’ (1994), unlike its American counterparts ‘This Life’ broke boundaries, displaying the lives of five lawyers, who share a house together in South London.

Egg

Football-Loving, Trying-to-find-his-place, Egg; who is also the boyfriend of Milly. Perhaps a template of the ‘Modern Man’.

Milly

The Shy, quiet, cautious one, Milly is the reserved, Intelligent, humble, girlfriend of Egg’s.

Miles

Dry wit, likes a drink after work, has a voracious appetite for sex, and “damaged goods”.

Anna

Sarcastic, as she is bitchy, Anna is a barrister with her talons out, with a tough exterior, and red lipstick to match.

Warren

The boy from the valleys, who rose to do good, no, it isn’t Tom Jones, but Warren, perhaps an anchor for the moral compass of the show.

For its time the show broke many taboos, showing a sex scene that was honest and tender, and not soft-core porn like, you know the surreal type, with great lighting, and bed sheets that remain stuck to a mattress like super glue; really now after coitus - how does a woman’s hair remain so pristine? Soft lighting, I presume.

I also found after watching series 1 & 2 that the relationships depicted in ‘This Life’ mainly Egg and Milly’s, felt sincere, this wasn’t just the typical on-screen happy couple, that split up and get together again, and had trivial arguments. No, this to me felt grounded in a foundation, it featured couples that showed tenderness, and respect to each other.

Also the on-screen friendship between the guys, the lads, the crew, the boys, the A-team, and so on. Felt genuine, you had working-class-with-a-degree Egg, privately-educated-Miles, and .. in between I-worked-damned-hard-to-get-here Warren. However, irregardless of their socio-economic backgrounds, when discussing the matters of life, over food and drink, or sharing a beer together its as if these friendships had been formed for years, and good friends as we all know are like these. Granted the casting was a stroke of superb, as the actors all feel at ease with another.

I feel its success came as an amalgamation, of good casting, a great theme tune (I don’t care what you say, the theme tune is a very important part, it sets the tone for the show) the scripts of course, were just so well-written, by a different range of writers ho each honed in on all these character’s flaws, and their good attributes, and in doing so created a palette of characters that spoke for young adults in the nineties.