I was five years old when Tom Baker regenerated into Peter Davison in the final episode of Logopolis in 1981. Admittedly I’d been an early developer (I can vividly remember watching everything from 1979’s Destiny of the Daleks onwards when I was only three), but although Tom was the first Doctor I saw, it was Peter’s Doctor who I grew up with.
By the time Peter made his full début in Castrovalva at the start of 1982, I was already obsessed with the Fifth Doctor. I’d learned how to draw him, and I’d started a scrapbook full of newspaper and magazine cuttings, putting in everything about Peter that I could lay my hands on. (“How many photos do you need of Peter Davison?” my Mum would cry.) I was even genuinely annoyed at the misspelling of his name on the cover of DWM 61.
My Dad had a panama hat a little bit like the Fifth Doctor’s, so it was easy to pretend that I was the Doctor, especially as I had a younger brother and sister who could be my companions. (I’d like to apologise now to my brother, John, whom I always forced to be Adric. I don’t think my sister, Helen, minded being Tegan, though. In fact, she was rather good at bossing us around. Toni the cat had to be Nyssa, and she was also rather good at it.)