CHASING MY "ON-AIR" DREAM 

    "Four Double G on the Gold Coast - with Greg Newman!" I sat on the opposite side of the studio console watching my friend with envy as he went through the paces of his evening music shift on the local commercial radio station.

    How I longed to be in his place, with my own radio program. Since my early teens, I had dreamed of becoming a radio announcer on a commercial station. I was an avid listener to all the stations in range of where I lived and picked up others on the radio in more distant towns late at night.

    I visited two of the local stations, 4GG, and also 2MW, Murwillumbah a little south of the Gold Coast - to watch the announcers in action and took the opportunity to observe them at work when presenting their music shifts from mobile caravan studios at shopping centres and at the beaches.

    But along with my heartfelt desire to make it into radio on air as an announcer, there was a sense of frustration. I knew that my right-sided facial paralysis, from birth, which affected my speech (as well as appearance) would present a major hurdle to the realisation of my dream.

    I would often record "mock" radio programs on my reel to reel tape recorder (hey, I'm showing my age), at home, feeling excited that I sounded just like the announcers I listened to. When played back, though, the realisation was that the problems in my speech were quite pronounced.

    When I became a Christian at the age of sixteen, my desire for radio did not wane. However, I completed Grade Twelve two years later and radio had to take a lesser priority in my life as I ventured into the world of employment.

    Initially, I undertook hospital-based General Nursing studies and then worked in my father's photographic and music retail business on the Gold Coast in Queensland.

    As a Christian, my desire to be better equipped led me to undertake a two-year Bible College training course at Lower Hutt, near Wellington in the North Island of New Zealand.

    During that time, my desire for radio resurfaced - this time with the dream that I might work in a Christian radio station.

    New Zealand had a group of people with a vision to establish a permanent Christian radio network. At that point in time, their first permanent licence had not been granted, however.  The vision for Christian radio in New Zealand was championed by Richard (Dick) Berry, who, in 1960, as a young man in Christchurch  had been healed by God of severe back pain. He told the Lord that he would commit his life to fully serving Him in whatever direction He would lead him. The Lord birthed in Richard a vision to establish Christian broadcasting in New Zealand, at a time when the only radio stations across the nation were government-owned and operated. There were not even any non-government commercial stations at the time.

    Returning to Australia at the start of 1978, I again found work in my father's business. My radio aspirations were fuelled by a thirty week (one night per week) radio/TV course called "Air-TV" conducted by local media professionals in Brisbane. The principals were Jim Iliffe, well-loved for his kids' television show, "The Channel Niners," and radio personality, John Knox.

    At the end of the course, I sent applications with "air-check" audition tapes to a number of country stations in Queensland and New South Wales. Some of the replies were encouraging, but the "big break" eluded me.

Did I ever fulfil my desire of becoming a radio announcer? To find out, tune in......oops, I mean, Log on to my Facebook page in the next few days to read more of my story.

COMING UP NEXT: ELATED! 😃 AND DEFLATED.