And not with predictably dramatic, yoof-orientated single issues, either, such as world poverty, animal rights or rolling over and sucking the BTM of any old Middle Eastern tyrant with a penchant for feeding his opponents through the shredder — oh sorry, being “antiwar”.

No, peculiar little me was interested in old-fashioned, two-party politics; the ceaseless tussle between Labour and Conservative about who gets to be First XI this time round. And this is even before Mrs T came along to give the whole shebang a kick up the jacksy! This is, in fact, the time of Titans like Ted Heath.

Like I said, demented.

Better still, I was totally hooked on the TV shows that covered my crazed obsession: Panorama, World In Action. And to cap it all, at Sunday lunchtimes when my parents were safely ensconced at the pub for a swift half, and my contemporaries out getting blind on scrumpy-and-Babycham, I used to commit the completely weird act of clambering on and off the glass-topped coffee table to the rousing theme tune of Weekend World, pretending that I was — ahem — Harold Wilson getting off a plane in some hotspot to sort things out.

That’s how obsessed I was with party politics when I was young. So when my section editor asked me on Monday morning to write about the TV coverage of the election, I realised with no small degree of awe that with less than two weeks to go till the big event, I had watched literally nothing about it. So I repaired to the sofa that afternoon with a guilty conscience and a box of Boasters, which I couldn’t help feeling was quite appropriate.

Old habits do die hard, though, and within ten minutes of turning on Sky News I was yelling support for John Reid, Blair’s bruiser-in-chief, as he was interviewed live on a bowling green in Rossendale & Darwen (maj. 4,970) slagging off the Lib Dems for wanting to legalise crack, the antiwar groupies for being tyrant-teasers (see above) and the Tories for everything. It was majestic, and I wondered why I’d stayed away from the hustings — well, the sofa — for so long.

Next up was the notorious Tory Dr Liam Fox, live from Westminster. He was talking about killer hospital superbugs, out-of-control immigration, the pensions crisis and eight years of broken promises, but I could think of only one thing as I looked at him: did he or didn’t he get jiggy with the goddess Natalie Imbruglia? And if he did: why? Does this prove the existence of Chaos Theory?

I was pondering this great question of the age, and the subsequent loss of faith which might result from an affirmative, when we were whisked to yet another bowling green, this time in Plymouth. I was confused by the seemingly random bowling motif but when, on turning to BBC News 24, I was transported first to a golf course and then on a riverboat ride, I saw that this was all part of the search for the Greater Crested Metaphor and had little reference to the real-life voting patterns of bowlers, golfers or boaters. Unless you count the “floating vote”, heh heh!

Then we were back in the studio with Michael Brunson, a solid, old-style TV current affairs man who has, I would wager, never once in his life sat saucily on a studio desktop and crossed his legs flirtatiously, exposing just a hint of peachy thigh in the process. Nevertheless, he was well on form as he chuckled over how the Tories had just decided to drop their profoundly lame campaign slogan of, “Are you thinking what we’re thinking?”

“People have been defacing the posters, with stuff like, ‘Are you smoking what we’re smoking?’ ” chuckled Michael, and I choked on my Boaster in appreciation. “There are signs of apathy all around,” Michael added, and I felt real love for our mature parliamentary democracy, where voting is an occasion for comfy stupefaction rather than blowing people up at polling booths.

The Tories’ new slogan, Michael revealed, was “Taking a stand on the issues that matter” — which, as he pointed out, seemed odd at this late date, like they’d decided to do this only ten days before the election, after previously taking a stand on silly issues.

Meanwhile, Labour had replaced “Britain forward not back” with “If you value it, vote for it”. This made me think of that great bit in Little Britain when the Italian Prime Minister says to Anthony Head, as our PM: “If you love heem, go after heem”, when David Walliams’s Sebastian storms out in a huff — and before I knew it I was imagining Tony Blair and Gordon Brown having rough, contemptuous sex with each other, as I do most days around sundown.

My erotic reveries were ruined by a party political broadcast on behalf of the Lib Dems. Whooah, Sandi Toksvig’s voice over Charles Kennedy’s face: it was like throwing a bucket of cold water over two rutting dogs, the immediate effect it had on me. “People do trust us,” said Kennedy, smugly (yeah, trust you to lose, as per Chazza!) There was the usual knee-jerk war-bashing and by the time Toksvig’s mash-note to Charlie had finished — well, he does have a face that only a lesbian could love — I felt ready for bed. But not in a sex way!