I never fail to feel a warm glow when a complete and utter stranger refers to me with a term of endearment that many of us save only for our near and dear ones.

Just a simple ‘Thank you my love’ from a shop assistant can make all the difference in a straight-forward retail experience. It just always feels so genuinely friendly.

It’s not the kind of thing that can be scripted in by management.

You can clinically train staff to ask if you’re having a good day and whether you managed to find everything you were looking for.

They’re also pretty good at insisting that their staff never ever fail to ask if you’ve got a loyalty card as if it was somehow as vital as your NHS entitlement.

And of course there’s often the embarrassed grimace that goes along with suggesting that you might like to consider applying for the store’s own credit card and getting 10 per cent off your purchases today.

However, it’s unlikely you can earn a customer service gold star for greeting a punter with a cheery ‘Hello poppet’. Sadly it’s possibly even discouraged.

It’s definitely something I’ve always considered to lurk in someone’s DNA. You can either do it or you can’t.

I can’t. I consider myself to be very open and friendly but I’ve never had the ability to feel comfortable peppering my everyday conversations with such colloquial expressions.

Well I couldn't, but I've realised now that maybe it’s an age-related thing.

There are of course exceptions to every rule, but on the whole the people sprinkling these marvellous terms of affection around tend to be of a certain age.

My grandparents were classic examples. I was privy to a few rather choice names they had for each other occasionally but everyone else on the planet was always enthusiastically referred to as Darling.

Who knows, maybe it was just a method that prevented them from committing the faux pas of getting anyone’s name wrong, but it was part of their characters that contributed to them being such darlings themselves.

I’ve always used pet names for my daughters. From the moment they were born I have rarely used their full given names but a series of nicknames they’d probably rather I didn’t commit to print.

But I realised that after hitting my 40s it became more common for me to use other affectionate names for them that I’d never used before.

I don’t think I’ll ever go around delivering a full-blown ‘Morning sweetie, I’ll have a single into town please my lover’ greeting to every bus driver I encounter – it’s just not me. But the other day, eating out with my family, I did actually hear myself say ‘Thank you lovely’ to the young waitress.

And believe me, It didn't go unnoticed. Forks went down and a stunned silence followed until my sister pitched an eyebrow and said ‘Wow, you’re turning into Nana’. So it’s happened: Darlings, I’ve arrived.