MY friend had a perm at the weekend. When she told me she was booked in at the hairdresser's for one, I thought she was joking. But no, she went ahead.

I went round to see her expecting to see her beautiful brown locks looking more like Bison wool.

But far from it - she looked great. Her hair was feathery, but not in a chick owl way, and soft. It had a little flick too, all the way round, and it really suited her.

I was, as they say, gobsmacked, and had to agree that perms - which, incredibly, were invented 100 years ago - have come a long way since the 1970s, when I craved one with a passion.

It was something I desperately wanted but couldn't have. Between the ages of 14 and 16, I would have done absolutely anything for a perm.

All my friends had them. They looked great with their locks a cross between a crimp and a curl, a head of hair that was easily scrunched into shape with their fingers.

I wanted to be like them, but I was told categorically by all and sundry that with my dry, frizzy hair, the outcome would be nothing short of catastrophic.

So I sat back and watched with envy as they all admired each other's new hair dos.

It didn't help that my footballing hero Kevin Keegan went out and had one done. And it had to be the week I went to watch Liverpool play my local team Middlesbrough - and got close enough afterwards to get his autograph.

Now I realise how bad they all looked, my friends and Kevin Keegan. Their hair was a complete state. They had parted with a lot of money for hair that looked totally unkempt, as if they had crawled through a hedge backwards.

In those days, every perm was a bad perm. And thinking back, it took ages to recover from them. My friends' hair seemed to go through various stages, from woolly, to shaggy, to - immediately after a wash - poodle. Then there were those perms that were so bad they didn't ever recover, which rapidly transformed silken locks into what looked like carpet fluff.

I think even back then I knew they looked awful, but I was an impressionable teenager.

It is hard to believe that the chemical treatment, invented by a German hairdresser, is a century old. If it was bad in the seventies, imagine the outcome back in 1906. No wonder the Edwardians wore flamboyant hats and used so many fancy hair accessories. They probably all looked like Kevin Keegan underneath.

In terms of hair product technology, 30 years is a long time. Since the 1970s, things are bound to have moved on. After seeing my friend's hair, I'm even mulling over the possibility of having my own done. It might get rid of the frizz. And, most vitally, it might undo the psychological damage caused by feeling left out as a teenager. Having a perm might give me "closure". I may go ahead.

Updated: 09:45 Tuesday, May 02, 2006