The Berlin Wall crumbles; the Persian Gulf War begins; Kate enters high school. 

"The Larry Sanders Show" airs. 

My first trip to California. Stepping off the plane was like stepping through the TV or movie screen. In England, we've seen LA thousands of time, driven on the freeways, waited with cops in abandoned lots, ran on the beach. But only ever on the screen. And when you step through the screen, everything is different, the lighting, perspective - you become a film star - you are living on the screen. 

"My So-Called Life" premieres on MTV 

Release of Four Weddings and a Funeral. I go to see the movie with my friend Lieve. As we're leaving the cinema, she turns to me and says, "That was you, wasn't it?" 

Kurt Cobain found dead in Seattle from self-inflicted gunshot wound. You always remember where you were. I was in central London with an Australian friend. We went to the Virgin Megastore and stood sadly watching banks of TV cameras taping the Nirvana CD racks and interviewing camera-hungry purchasers. 

Foregoing the traditional allusions to Ulysses, Kate incorporates dialogue from Diane Court's valedictory speech into her own. 

Release of The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill and Came Down a Mountain. By now I'm living in California, and constantly compared to Hugh, since we're both English and have floppy hair. A friend insists on taking me as her date to see The Englishman so that she can have "Hugh" on her arm in the cinema lobby. 

11.00 am I leave the US and return to England after a year living in Santa Cruz, CA studying towards my BA. Just in time.  

1.45am - Hugh is arrested in Hollywood and booked "on suspicion of lewd conduct in a public place" after being caught having oral sex with a prostitute, Stella Marie Thompson, aka Divine Brown, 25, in a rented white B.M.W. convertible off Sunset Boulevard.  

Halloween: Kate, accompanied by two girlfriends, dresses as one of the Charlie's Angels (Jaquelyn Smith) 

Kate meets John Cusack in the Temple Bar area of Dublin. She asks if she can be his Diane Court; he declines. 

You always remember where you were. William Burroughs dies of a heart attack. I was in Brighton, working towards finishing my MA dissertation. I heard the news on the radio the next day and left the house to buy all the broadsheet newspapers to read the obituaries.  

You always remember where you were. Just after midnight on August 31, 1997, Princess Di was in a fatal car accident with Dodi Fayed in Paris. It was a Sunday - I got up at 6am and ran a bath. It was the last day before the deadline for my MA dissertation. I turned on the radio and heard the announcer talking about the death of the "princess." For some reason I thought it was Princess Anne. When I realised it was Diana I was profoundly shocked. Never particularly interested in the Royal Family or in Diana's doings (reported widely in the British tabloid press) nonetheless I felt a great sense of mourning for this figure who had, subliminally, been important for whatever reason in my life. I spent four hours when I should have been working watching the TV coverage. 

Halloween: Kate dresses as Mrs. Robinson 

"Dawson's Creek" airs 

Release of Notting Hill. 

Halloween: Kate dresses as Leda and the Swan 

Rob slips into a corset and a $10 thrift store dress, slicks his unmanageable hair back, and dons clip-on earrings and lipstick. Many of his fellow party-goers are convinced that a "Palmer girl" has graced the party with her presence - but then, they had been drinking.