I must be maturing because I’m not quite so scared of funerals as I used to be (apart from my own, which I trust will be a long way off considering my mum is still going strong, and is normal, at ninety-five). Until fairly recently I couldn’t concentrate on a church funeral service owing to my vivid imaginings of the poor dead body inside the coffin, and crematoriums (or is that crematoria?) were even worse… Those nasty curtains… the final curtain. Did you know that the machine for burning is called a crematory? (Not to be confused with a crème de la crème Tory like our Prime Minister Theresa May!)

Anyway, by now I’ve attended enough funerals to be discriminating about them. My favourite was the Humanist funeral for my old boyfriend Chris who died too young from drink. He used to say that he had hundreds of friends down the pub yet only three of them, one of whom was the landlord, turned up to say good-bye. My old boyfriend had never married but, being a handsome man, he had had many girlfriends – thank goodness – and his funeral was well attended with ex-girlfriends and their husbands or partners. The Humanist funeral celebrant spoke plainly and sincerely about Chris’s life; and after the service we ex-girlfriends all greeted one another with open arms and compared stories.

“I remember seeing your photo,” said one attractive lady to me.

“I always worried about what happened to my photos,” said another.

And we all laughed and thought how pleased old Chris would have been if he were in Heaven looking down on his old girlfriends regaling each other with funny stories and happy memories of being with Chris. But, of course, he couldn’t have been looking down on us because it was a Humanist funeral and he was in a woven palm frond coffin.

That was the best funeral. It helps if you’re not, or perhaps I should say no longer (in this case), too close to the deceased.

My dad’s funeral was the worst – we loved him so much.

My dear friend Amr’s funeral was the next worst. He was buried on my birthday, an extremely cold eleventh of November that year. Friends and family gathered around the graveside, our heels sinking into the mud, and only two people – my husband Chris and Amr’s daughter Laila – could manage to sing the words to Rod Stewart’s song “Sailing”; the rest of us were crying (although my proclivity to laugh when I shouldn’t nearly got the better of me when Laila began harmonising with Chris).

My cousin Christine spoke so beautifully of her mother as we stood at Aunty Eve’s grave. My aunt lived in Somerset so I didn’t know her particularly well, all the same,  enough to cry for the loss of her in our family’s lives and especially for my cousins’ loss.

If you’re wondering why I’m contemplating on funerals today, well, it’s not really so strange because my husband Chris (new Chris, although he was older than old Chris who died) and I went to a funeral recently. Actually it was this morning but I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings so I won’t say whose funeral it was. Suffice it to say, the deceased was exceedingly old and more of an acquaintance than a friend.

I suppose that when you’re a nonagenarian you’ve outlived most of your contemporaries, and you probably don’t go out as much as you did so you don’t have many new acquaintances and friends – or any. Hence, the church seemed rather big and the mourners rather scanty. We and a friend of ours sat on the opposite side of the central aisle to the few others who had gathered to show their respect.

The organ came to life to the tune of Amazing Grace and the vicar lead the cortege; we turned to see that immediately behind him was a severe-looking woman dressed in black, wearing a top hat like an old-fashioned riding hat; then the coffin carried by six burly men (to lift about nine stones I reckon), and then the family who occupied the first two lines of pews on our side of the church.

The vicar, who was himself old, read out a few lines written by each of the two grandchildren and then a young man with a sheet of paper read out his thoughts about his great-grandmother – unfortunately, he spoke too quickly and his mouth was too far from the microphone for anyone beyond the front pew to hear. The vicar congratulated the young man and we had the first hymn. After a somewhat long introduction one or two of the congregation sang, “The Lord’s our shepherd…” On verse three all was not as expected for the vicar began singing verse four… I sang a bit louder to let him know his mistake but he carried on undaunted and by the last two lines we three singers were in unison. The organist must have been in on it – he stopped with the vicar’s lead (it must be a well-known trick to save time!). Two short readings from the bible and we were into our next hymn, “All Creatures Great and Small”, and three verses in – would you believe it? – the vicar began singing verse four. This time we two singers took our cue and accompanied the vicar to the end. A prayer or two followed and the organ started up again – Amazing Grace – and the dominatrix with the riding hat and stick led the cortege back down the aisle. It was over.

When my time comes, which I hope will be a long way off, I don’t want a vicar who doesn’t know me conducting a service for twenty-two people, some of whom barely knew me. No pomp either please. No lady with a funny hat and solemn expression. Give me a gathering of those who loved me, sending me off with a prayer and thoughts of any good I might have done in my life. Tears, yes – why not? That would be my idea of a funeral to die for.

Oh no, James Bond is dead!