ANYONE who was a teenager in the early noughties will remember the sheer excitement of getting a new mobile phone.

That was back when Nokias were all the rage (iWhat?) and it was an event to go to Carphone Warehouse clutching your birthday money to choose the device that would definitely, no doubt about it, get the popular girls to notice you.

It wasn't a decision to be taken lightly and everyone knew it was a numbers game.

Would you go 3210 or 3230? Would you go with BT Cellnet (10p a text), Vodafone (12p per text) or would you stick with One2One?

If you'd had a bumper cheque off grandma that year, would you go for the phone all your mates had or would you take a chance on this new-fangled 'colour screen' business?

("Colour screen! Can you believe it? Next they'll be telling us we'll have internet on our mobiles!")

But everyone at school knew their cool factor rested on the handset they chose.

When it was inevitably confiscated in maths on Monday morning you wanted admiring looks from the lad you secretly fancied.

You wanted to be able to look him in the eye and say: "How many contacts do you have in your phone book? Cos I've got 45 and none of them are my family."

You wanted to beat his top score on Snake, so you could tell him with a withering (aka 'please ask me out') look: "It's because your phone is, like, sooooo old."

And most importantly, you wanted all your settings just right, so you could dazzle everyone with your choice of ring tone.

Fast forward a few years and I wish I could say I'm less shallow.

But on Saturday I took delivery of my brand spanking new iPhone (Nokia who?) and I'd ripped open the box before the postman had even made it off the drive.

I've spent the weekend staring at the screen of my lovely new toy, getting everything 'just so' - and it's possible I've been a little antisocial.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll have to leave it there because I think I'm getting withdrawal symptoms.

And a super-awesome ring tone won't choose itself, will it?