'Computers are marvellous!': older people embrace internet in lockdown

Pandemic has prompted some people to confront their insecurities about venturing online

Before the pandemic struck, 79-year-old Jim Whelan barely used his computer. The online world was a mystery and an irrelevance to him. A year on, however, Whelan can give computer geeks half his age a run for their money.

Although I had been online before the pandemic, it was just the occasional answering of emails. Now I'm a past master at all sorts of amazing things," said Whelan, a former Coronation Street actor who before the pandemic used to travel around local community groups to give talks about his 50 years in the acting profession.