My first extremely low power transmission was using a Tandy 10 in 1 Junior Electronic Lab Kit. One of the 10 circuits you could build was called "Home" Broadcasting Radio Station, a 1 transistor medium wave transmitter.

I was 15 and had got a radio cassette player for my birthday. I can't remember why I was playing around with the Tandy 10 in 1 Junior Electronic Lab Kit because I'm sure I had already had it for a few years. Anyway the signal traveled about a foot.

The important thing that came out of that Sunday afternoon was that, while tuning the radio to hear the very weak signal, I came across my 1st pirate station (North London Radio on 221mw) being run by none other than Garry Stevens! So I blame him for turning me into an Anorak.

Soon after I moved on to the FM bugs that you could buy in Exchange & Mart for a couple of quid. They were very unstable but I could hear one of mine a mile away. Then I moved on to bigger and better stuff but that is another story.