Two weeks into my mayoral year, I had the honour of delivering a tribute to the Queen at the beacon lighting ceremony in Christchurch Park.

Writing my speech for the event provided me with an opportunity to consider her amazing service over the last 70 years, but also to consider how our lives have changed from those of our parents and grandparents.

This event, which launched our Jubilee celebrations in Ipswich, was followed by street parties and community events over the long weekend, bringing together the diverse community we have in Ipswich.

I experienced music from jazz to steel bands to choral singing; barbecues, cream teas, coronation chicken sandwiches and even some home made traditional Romanian cakes.

The Queen has been a presence throughout my life, and throughout the adult lives of the generation before me.

My 86 year-old father was born a few months after the death of George V, and had lived through Edward VIII’s abdication and the coronation of George VI before he was a year. But as a young adult, it was to Queen Elizabeth that he swore his oath of allegiance as a national serviceman, and later as a police officer.

In recent days, royal commentators have tried to calculate how many people the Queen met over the course of her reign.

Apparently, it runs into millions; a figure that doesn’t include me, although I did see her in person twice, once in 1968 and again in 1977 during the Silver Jubilee. Strangely my memory from 1968, despite being only four years old, is the stronger of the two.

The route of the royal car took the Queen past a local park on my father’s police beat. He tipped my mum off that we should be outside the park gates at the appointed time.

After a play session in the park to burn off our youthful energy, my mother positioned my brother, sister and I at the roadside and after a short wait, we received a royal wave all to ourselves as the royal car came past.

Later as a cub scout, scout, venture scout and scout leader, I promised to do my duty to the Queen, and at nineteen became a Queen’s Scout, attending the 1985 St George’s Day Parade at Windsor Castle.

As Mayor of Ipswich, I often entertain visitors to Ipswich, and indeed local Ipswich people in the Mayor’s Parlour at the Town Hall. The Queen visited the parlour twice, though sadly not on my watch.

Visitors are always pleased to learn that they had their tea poured from the same pot from which the Queen’s tea was poured, and also to see her signature in our visitor’s book – always open on the relevant page in a display cabinet, before signing their own names in our current visitor’s book.

Thousands attended the Proclamation last Sunday and this week I represented the Borough at two packed memorial services at St Mary-le-Tower Church here in Ipswich and at St Edmundsbury Cathedral.

By the time you read this, I will also have led Sunday’s one minute silence on the Town Hall steps, and if you’re reading this on Monday morning, the Borough will have a big screen up on the Cornhill for those who’d like to see the Royal funeral as a community, rather than at home on their own. Why not join us there?