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Remember the X rating on movies? Back in the day, movies that were considered unsuitable for children were just rated X. None of this `parental guidance' nonsense. The X covered horror movies as well.

I used to gaze longingly at those horror movie posters, depicting vampires, creepy old houses and creatures from just about everywhere. I longed to see Christopher Lee sink his fangs into the latest buxom starlet, or Peter Cushing track him down with wooden stake at the ready.

That X was my worst nightmare. It was only ever stuck on the movies I wanted to see. MNovies like the creature from the Black Lagoon, or the Blob.

"We're going to see The Blob," my father said. "You can go and watch Pinnochio." He pressed the ticket money into my hand, and then he and my mother would flaunt their adulthood by passing the door marked by an X. I sat with the little kids watching Pinocchio being swallowed by a whale and wondering why this film didn't have an X rating as well.

But I couldn't think of anything cooler than being allowed to see The Blob. Older kids just pass the magic age of 16 would tell me in superior tones how creepy and scarey it was.

"Scarier than the Creature from the Black Lagoon?"

"Oh, MUCH scarier than that. Too scary for a little kid like you."

But I loved vampires and creatures from outer space and huge gorillas who ran off with nubile earth women. That used to baffle my father.

"What's King Kong going to DO with her?" My father wanted to know. "Stick her in a cage and feed her mice?"

"Hush, not in front of the child," my mother would scold.

I really wanted to see The Blob. I sat through Pinnochio in a sulky silence, thinking of the screams and moans of the terrified audience in the cinema next door.

"As soon as I am 16," I promised myself, "I am going to see an X rated movie."

And I did. On TV. The Blob.

Maybe it lost something on the small screen. Maybe I lost something growing up. But I did discover why my dad, a Marx Brothers and Daffy Duck fan from way back, loved X rated horror movies.

I never laughed so much in my life. It was even funnier than the plastic pink full color version that I saw later, also on TV.

I still love those old X rated movies. The Creature from the Black Lagoon? Hilarious. Bride of Frankenstein? Better than Jerry Seinfeld. Better than Jerry Springer, even.

Pass the popcorn. It's time for the late night horror show. Bela Lugosi. Cool.

Learn more about this author, Gail Kavanagh.
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