The First Album I Ever Bought is an occasional guest post series where friends, family, and strangers talk about, well, the first album they ever bought. A new piece runs every Wednesday, and sometimes more often. If you’d like to submit, please see the guidelines here.

The first album that I bought for myself was the eponymous debut album by Herman’s Hermits.  It was summer 1965, and I was 14.

My Uncle Howard and Aunt Edith were en route from Pennsylvania to Florida for a vacation and they broke up the trip with a stop in High Point, NC, to pay us a visit.  I don’t remember much else about the visit, but I do remember Uncle Howie slipping money into my hand as we hugged goodbye.  It was probably five dollars, but I’m not sure.  That was enough to keep me in Tiger Beat magazines for a couple of months, but I forewent my media rag habit and hightailed it to the record store. I’m embarrassed to admit that I don’t remember the name of the store.

This was the heyday of the British Invasion, so there were a lot of possibilities.  I loved The Beatles, The Animals, Freddie and the Dreamers – pretty much all of the British bands.  But I bought Herman’s Hermits.  Of all the groups, the Hermits were the cutest, and of all the Hermits, Herman, aka Peter Noone, was the cutest.  He still is.  He shows up periodically on PBS to shill for the “Greatest Hits of the 60s”.

I still remember the words to all the songs and the order they appeared on the record.  A lot of them were very silly, covers of old vaudeville songs, but I loved them then and I love them now.  I wonder what happened to this record.  I haven’t seen it in 40 years.

Susan Dillard Donkar is a retired librarian, a skilled whistler, and an aspiring yodeler, and also my mama.