Spent a frustrating hour doodling about on a couple of those "find your family" websites, at my daughters' insistence. My late mothers' family tree was quite well known, at least the Cambridge end of it, given that they were quite a close family anyway. But my fathers' family.... after about an hour, I didn't have anything new except that my grandmothers' maiden name was Saunders. My fathers' military service was a blank, and I still have his medals, and know the outline of it. I didn't find other facts already known, such as the date of his marriage to my mother, or facts known but not in detail, such as his divorce from his failed wartime marriage in about 1947.

My grandfather, a shadowy figure, remains elusive. I did learn, from a discussion forum, that in an age of home deliveries and registration of births often on the unsupported word of the parents, no driving licences or passports, these things often aren't traceable. One of my uncles was known to have enlisted underage in the 1930s, another was known to have returned from the wars in about 1919 under an assumed name.

So if it's not feasible to find information still at the limits of living memory, these sites must be a disappointment to a lot of people..