When I was a teenager I would have done anything to straighten my hair.

And I did do almost anything to get rid of my curls - tying it in sections when wet, stretching it with a strong comb, even running a cool iron over it.

Stupid, I know, but I wanted straight hair that I could flick over my shoulder like some of the ‘it’ girls at my school, the ones boys drooled over, who managed to look great with zero effort.

I remember once being in class and staring at the long straight hair of the girl in front, and wishing so hard that I could swap. To add insult to injury, hers was blonde.

So I was stuck, as I still am, with a curly mass of ginger. “It’s out of control, it has a life of its own,” a colleague recently joked after I arrived at work on a windy day.

What I would have given for a pair of hair straighteners. In those days, other than a hair dryer, curling tongs were about the only accessory you could buy for your locks. I certainly did not need those.

Now everyone can have straight hair and most households possess a pair of straighteners.

I’ve been surprised by confessions of women I know, whose hair I always believed was poker straight until they told me it is naturally curly. They get up at an unearthly hour to straighten it, they tell me.

Former MP Anne Widdecombe found herself in the spotlight after amusing footage of her not altogether successful attempts to use straighteners were aired on Celebrity Big Brother.

I shouldn’t have laughed - I’ve never got to grips with them either.

And there is much debate around how Meghan Markle tames her naturally curly hair.

My daughters once persuaded me to have my hair straightened by a professional - and the difference was dramatic. I looked nothing like me.

Silky and smooth, as I tossed it about, it was easy to convince myself that I resembled Rachel from Friends. But, of course, I didn’t. I am not even sure that I suited it.

After a couple of days the curls began to creep back and after I had washed it things were back to normal. To keep it flat would have required at least an hour every morning damaging my wrists with all the twisting and turning and squirting on hair product that straightening demands.

I am also convinced that ironing your hair - because that is what it is - every day can’t be good for you in the long term.

My daughters have straight hair and yet they still use these contraptions. Convinced her current ones are not up to the job, my youngest daughter is hankering after an upgrade - the pair she wants cost more than £100. It’s a lot of money to straighten hair that is already straight.

It seems to me that, nowadays, everyone wants straight hair, yet when I was at school whatever you had you didn’t want. My straight-haired friends used to tell me how they envied my locks, some even had perms to curl their hair and my straight-haired sister rose early to style hers with tongs.

There is no doubt that straight hair is easier to manage. Curly hair tangles much more easily, goes frizzy in damp weather and needs constant patting down and taming. Every morning when I wake up, depending upon how I have slept, my hair can be full of odd bends, sticking-out clumps and crumples that need attention before I leave the house.

But at 57, I have had enough time to get used to it, so my days of hankering after straight hair are well and truly over. Now I’m more concerned about it turning grey.