For most of us, sitting in our living rooms looking for an excuse not to talk to each other of a Thursday night, a million million miles away from moon landings and Cold War tension and Third World famine, it is the addiction to a little flickering box in the corner that has shaped our lives since the late 1950s. In this personal tribute to teleheaven, Stuart Jeffries explores the way in which our lives have been coloured by looking at the world through the cathode ray tube; how the historical markers of late 20th century Britain have been, not wars and treaties, coronations and abdications, executions and pardons, but Noel Edmond's beard, Angela Rippon's legs, and, if you're free, Mrs Slocombe's pussy.