PINK gin and anchovies are two of the things that can be described as ‘Marmite tastes’. Even catamarans have been called the Marmite of powerboating – you either love them or hate them.

It is interesting how this brand has become a figure of speech because of its power to provoke violent passion one way or the other. The salty spread divides people but I know where I stand – and I bet you do too.

My first taste came when a family from London moved into our road. Maybe others in Birmingham had discovered it already but I’d not had Marmite before, even though it had been around since the turn of the century, and I was astonished to find it on the breakfast table when I stayed at their house overnight.

Until then I had been more of a boiled egg and soldiers or lemon curd and toast sort of person, but I was soon hooked on the brewer’s yeast product and thought it very sophisticated.

These days I love Marmite on toast and in soups, even in a sandwich with slices of banana.

You can now buy it already baked into rice cakes and it gives a wonderful kick when flavouring those little round cheeses you buy in nets at the supermarket.

A Fisher family favourite is an old chop suey recipe, allegedly from the Second World War, which includes Marmite. Now that is bizarre.

Did people in this country really cook Chinese food during the rationing years?

? WALLIS Simpson was also apparently an acquired taste, a woman who definitely didn’t tickle everyone’s palette once she had snared HRH Prince Edward, then heir to the throne.

He was crowned king but reigned only for a year, and on Sunday it was 75 years since the BBC broadcast in which he announced his decision to abdicate to be with ‘the woman I love’.

Madonna, that other diva, has made a film about the pair, which was due to open in the US on this anniversary.

I grew up thinking the royal love affair was so romantic, and I can’t wait for the film to get to Uxbridge – it will probably not be until February next year.

Will we love it or hate it? Hmm…