We met on the Net!

This is the delightful scenario in the new Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks' film, You've Got Mail, only this couple meet via the Internet - using e-mail.

But of course things like this only happen in the movies don't they?

Well no, they happen in Horwich and they can happen pretty quickly as a matter of fact.

Let's take a trip to Stoke-on-Trent and a cottage in the middle of nowhere.

Mum-of-three, Linda Mountford is idly tinkering with her 15-year-old daughter's computer. There's no-one at home and she's only recently mastered the skill of tapping into the e-mail site her daughter, Jenny has set up for her.

Suddenly she comes across an ad that immediately grabs her attention. It's from Ian Rodgers, a chap in Horwich, Bolton, whose sense of humour shines through his message.

She replies, he answers, she replies etc - and so it goes for a few days. Over the following two weeks, they speak on the phone for hours at a time, eventually arranging a meeting.

Within five weeks of their first e-mail Linda has moved up to Horwich to live with Ian - much to the astonishment of her friends and family, who thought she was making the biggest mistake of her life.

"That was last August and we're still together, living in absolute bliss," smiles the 45-year-old.

But it hasn't all been plain sailing - far from it.

When she first e-mailed Ian, she was still living with her husband of 15 years.

"We'd led separate lives for a long time," she explains, "he did his thing and I did mine. So when I met Ian I considered myself single."

Considering the swiftness of their co-habitation, you could be forgiven for thinking Linda and Ian are, to put it politely, a little mad.

"Oh, we've been called much worse than that," laughs Linda, "try - idiotic, crazy, off-our-heads and insane.

"We just call it 'in love'," she smiles.

During their on-line courtship the couple met three times. The first meeting was arranged for a Saturday evening when Ian, a surveyor for a Manchester firm, planned to drive down to Stoke.

"He telephoned me on the Friday evening," recalls Linda, "and we were both so excited - and a little nervous - at the prospect of finally meeting.

"I mean, we'd initially been looking for friendship and nothing else."

But now they were both eager to meet.

By the middle of the telephone call the meeting had been brought forward to Saturday afternoon and then Saturday morning.

"Then Ian just said, 'what the heck I'm driving down now'," she laughs.

"Within a couple of hours he was knocking on Linda's front door. They'd already seen photos of each other - on the Internet of course - so more or less knew what to expect.

"We just talked and talked, right into the early hours," says Ian, 44. "We went for a walk and then went back to the house and talked even more."

"I remember we kept nodding off to sleep," grins Linda, "we were so tired but we didn't want to miss a thing."

Soon after, Linda travelled up to Horwich to stay with Ian, who had separated from his wife and lived alone.

Linda remembers: "We had a fantastic weekend and the only blot on the landscape was the fact that I had to return to Stoke on the Sunday night.

"Ian drove me back and I remember sitting in Sandbach Services feeling like it was the end of the world. We both did.

"In fact, everytime we pass those services now, we still feel weird."

More e-mails followed - lots, lots more - and a couple more visits to Horwich. It was on the third visit that Linda told Ian she didn't want to go back to Stoke.

"I told her I didn't want her to go back," he smiles.

A move up North was hastily arranged and the couple drove down to collect Linda's things ...and her youngest daughter, Jenny.

"My other kids had flown the nest and I knew I couldn't leave without Jenny," says Linda.

"But because she was 15 I knew it wasn't going to be easy - she's got lots of friends and was about to start her GCSEs."

And Linda's parents weren't too happy with her "rash" decision.

"My mum said I was mad and I was going to live with someone who might turn out to be an axe murderer," she laughs.

"But, I don't know what it was, I knew I was doing the right thing. I'd never done anything with my life apart from stay at home and bring up my kids.

"Don't get me wrong - I've loved every minute of that, but I just thought 'this is my chance of true happiness, I'm going to grab it'."

Thankfully everything turned out just right. Jenny - given the option of moving to Horwich or staying in Stoke with her dad - decided to move with her mum and Ian and is now happily settled in a local school - the same one as Ian's two children.

Linda's parents now think the world of Ian - "my mum loves him to bits" - and the couple are planning to get married.

Linda says: "I've heard of lots of couples meeting on the Net - some happy endings and some not so happy.

"I'd love to hear from people who have a similar story to tell - I just wish everyone could be as happy, and as lucky, as me and Ian."

And do they still get e-mail.

"We still e-mail each other," giggles Linda, "it's where we met so it still has a special significance for us.

"Anyway," she smiles, "you can send romantic messages by e-mail."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.