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Greenacre in Sydney’s western heartland, where Greg spent the first decade of his life. The Welch family lived in Mimosa Road, in a small fibro cottage they shared with Greg’s maternal grandparents. It was a tight squeeze as Greg’s Dad Pat, Mum Noelene, elder (by two and half years) brother Darren and young Greg crammed into the house with Pop and Nan.
    Greg’s world was safe and predictable and, to a young child, almost idyllic. People knew their neighbours by name, barefoot kids roamed freely around the suburb, every family seemed to have a dog and nobody bothered to lock the doors of their houses or cars. Armed with a few beers, some chops and sausages, friends would drop by without warning and stay for a barbie. Neighbours would keep an eye on each other’s kids and regularly include them as blow-ins for dinner.
    To this day, Greg remembers the backyard cricket and footy as well as the ever-present corgis bred by Pat and Noelene, especially a champion Welsh corgi named Suzanne. ‘I went out one day to retrieve a cricket ball. She got out as I opened the gate and she was run over, by [former Australian Test cricketer] Len Pascoe’s father. Ouch! I was in the shitter for a bit!’
    Greg’s beloved Pop, Jack Jessup, a hard-working wharfie, had certain unbreakable house rules. The first wasn’t surprising for a man who was originally a bootmaker. ‘I had to take Pop’s shoes off after he arrived home from work on the wharves in Sydney. Then I had to shine the bloody things. Pop used to love shoving his socks under my nose after he took off his shoes. We had a cupboard which contained the shoe polish and brushes. Actually, we all had proper school uniforms and I quite liked shining shoes. We were also made to sit at the dinner table and use correct manners. But I always got out of washing up. Mum was such a pushover!’
    Another one of Pop’s rules was that the kids always had to eat every skerrick of food on their plate. ‘We always sat down for Sunday lunch. One day we had fish and I couldn’t, or wouldn’t, eat it. My friends were banging on the door and I wasn’t allowed to leave the table. They were going to Greenacre Pool—it was a scorcher of a day—and I couldn’t go. I cried and cried, but in the end I did eat the fish.’
    Noelene remembers Greg following his Pop around like a puppy. ‘He loved doing everything with Pop. My Dad was his idol. Dad had an infectious personality. He was a wonderful storyteller and joker. I see my father in Greg, entirely.’
    Greg remembers Pop always being included in every family adventure. ‘I used to call him the bald eagle—he was as bald as a badger. We got on really well. In many ways he was like a father to me. I had two fathers, almost.’
    Greg’s Dad Pat spent long hours trying to make a success of his printing business at Penshurst. Noelene did the books and worked there when her commitments with the kids allowed. It meant Greg spent lots of time with his grandfather. Jack Jessup was a natural sportsman and, like his sisters, a fine dancer. Only 20 years older than his daughter Noelene, he played a lot of tennis and golf until his wife’s health started to deteriorate. Above all, Jack was a family man, and sport took a back seat to every hour of overtime he could grab as he struggled to pay the bills, especially Nan’s growing medical costs.
    Jack cared tenderly for Nan, whose kidneys were failing. There were no kidney transplants in those days, and she died in 1966, at the age of just 44, when Greg was almost 2 years old. After Nan died, Darren shared one bedroom with Pop while Pat and Noelene had the other, with Greg and Justin, their third son, who was born in mid-1972, in the third.
    Greg inherited much of his bubbling good humour and yarn-spinning skills from his Pop. Jack Jessup was strongly built and of medium height, and he had a strawberry-red nose,