Born in Plymouth on the 11th of February 1942, to Burt Trickey, a wartime fireman and later a greengrocer, and his wife Lil, Den grew up in the city with his siblings, Frances, Dave, Jean, Marlene and Ron. Theirs was a very close-knit family and, with eight people squeezed into a three-bedroom council house, there was never a dull moment. Den and his siblings enjoyed riding on their dad’s lorry as he made deliveries throughout Plymstock and always looked forward to the thruppence he gave them every Sunday morning. With it, they would buy a paper for their dad and sweets for themselves. Apparently, you could get quite a lot of sweets for thruppence in those days.