I grew up in Hackney in a little terrace house with an outdoor toilet. My mum and dad were really strict. They were post-Windrush generation parents, quite scared about bringing me and my three sisters up, making sure that we were prepared for life, because it wasn’t going to be that easy. Like a lot of immigrant parents, they were always cautious, really nervous. And I was taught, very young, that to have anything decent, you had to sacrifice. There was no slacking allowed.
I was more afraid of my dad disciplining me than any teacher or policeman. With his friends, he was Mr Personality, he had the most charisma of any man I knew. He was the overlord of everything. I looked at him with a mixture of admiration and fear. It wasn’t a lovey-dovey upbringing. I felt more of a sense of duty. But it did prepare me for real life.
Music was my escape. From the age of 13 or 14 it just consumed me. I didn’t have money to buy records, so I’d tape cassettes off the radio. I could close my eyes, put music on and be anywhere.
All kids should dream, but I didn’t. People often say to me: “Did you always want to do radio?” But I couldn’t dream about being something I never saw someone doing. I never saw a Black astronaut, I never saw a Black policeman or a Black TV presenter. I smashed my 11-plus and ended up going to a grammar school, but there wasn’t a culture of going to uni and I didn’t want to leave Hackney. I felt safe there. All I wanted was to be independent and get a job, so I could give my mum some money. Then I’d be a man. I didn’t want to upset myself by dreaming and not achieving those dreams.
I was petrified of dying when I was 15. I remember obsessing over it, 15 was a big age for me. I used to stare at myself in the mirror and ask myself every single question I could think of. “I’m a Black kid in England. Why am I here?” Or: “We’re all going to die one day. Why are we born?” You couldn’t Google the answers in those days. You had to work stuff out yourself. So that’s what I did.
I remember every single time I’ve been racially abused in my life. That’s how powerful racism is.
Whitney Houston is the only person who has ever made me feel starstruck. I got quite casual with artists when I interviewed them on MTV: Janet Jackson, Beyoncé… I was probably fronting a little bit – I saw a lot of presenters kissing their arses. I spent 12 years at MTV and DJing at Pacha in Ibiza. But I was only ever starstruck by Whitney. I’m proud to say that.
I get introduced all the time as “the coolest” this or that. People think I’m cool because I’m Black, I’ve got a bald head, I play soul music and hip-hop late at night on the radio. It doesn’t annoy me, but it’s a cliché. And I think: I’m not that cool. I was a geek at school. I was the chess champion. I stamp-collected at one point. I love golf. I love my garden. I love staying at home. I’m as normal as they come.
I’ve learned to enjoy the good days in life. Because the only guarantee in life is that there’s problems around the corner.
Tickets are on sale now for Trevor Nelson’s Soul Christmas, 18 December, Royal Albert Hall, London. The show will be broadcast on Radio 2 later that week
