As I write it is a warm Sunday afternoon and I am consuming a bottle of Australian red wine. You know the problem; once you have opened it, the forces of nature command you to finish the bottle. It is only 14 per cent proof but that is enough to send my mind down nostalgia lane and recall memories of 40 years ago.

I have told this anecdote before, but not for a while, and new readers join us every week, not to mention our worldwide family of friends on the internet. Indeed, only recently I had emails from a reader in Texas and another in New Zealand — so film nostalgia is alive and well.

My memory has drifted back to the day I arrived at the MGM british studio gatehouse in Elstree Way with a letter from the new owners authorising me to spend three days looking over the 115-acre dream factory. The studio had closed a few months earlier and the property company was already making plans for the site’s future.

In the interim, the studio stood empty except for a security man in the gatehouse and his vicious guard dog. When I arrived he handed me a set of keys and said: “Go where you want mate".

So I embarked on a journey of discovery. Only a film fan would appreciate the thrill of finding oneself alone and exploring what had been the largest studio in the UK. The great MGM had produced many classic films on the site as had other film companies, but now it stood forlorn and awaiting demolition.

I first wandered onto the 100-acre backlot and visited the decaying Thrift Farm, which MGM had bought in the Forties to expand the studio which had been built before the Second World War.

As a youngster in the Sixties, I remember sheep grazing on the land bordering Elstree Way. A large street set was still standing, if a bit weatherbeaten, which a couple of years earlier I had seen on screen in Quatermass And The Pit. There were also some sets from The Dirty Dozen. Not long before, part of a mountain had been created for Where Eagles Dare and a castle set for Roman Polanski’s The Fearless Vampire Killers. If you want to see some of this look at a DVD of the television series UFO, which in 1969 incorporated the backlot into two or three storylines.

After that I started to explore the buildings. The sound stages where Spencer Tracy, Elizabeth Taylor, Clark Gable and Grace Kelly had filmed scenes now stood empty, awaiting their fate. You could almost hear Stewart Granger complaining about his costumes on Beau Brummell or Margaret Rutherford raising a laugh as Miss Marple.

The dressing rooms were still intact, still awaiting the arrival of Ava Gardner or Sharon Tate. I walked into the makeup department and found photographs of the stars scattered on the floor and in an office found a pile of scripts including Village Of The Damned, Ivanhoe and 2001. I later asked the property company about them, but they wanted £2 each and I was only earning £15 a week so there they remained. But I did pinch a number of documents I found in an office store room full of box files.

One day I hope to write a book about the Rolls Royce of studios. Those three days long ago remain in my mind as an experience that cannot be repeated. I would love to hear from anyone who worked at MGM and learn about your memories.

Finally, I must end by pay tribute to a pre-war Elstree Studios star who died recently. Googie Withers became a star at Elstree in the Thirties and continued to act for more than 60 years. I once had the pleasure of meeting Googie, and three or four years ago spoke on the phone to her in Australia, where she then lived.

On both occasions she spoke warmly about her memories of Elstree Studios and when Borehamwood was little more than a rural village. Another link with the past gone but her films remain.

Well readers, our journey down nostalgia lane must conclude, as there is another bottle of wine wanting to ‘breathe’.