. I started in my job at 17 although I had two previous jobs after leaving school at 16. In many respects I consider myself to have been lucky. I left school with one o'level and managed to get on what at the time was Maggie Thatchers job opportunity scheme (3 million unemployed) which opened the door to get into a job that I worked my way up in throughout the years. After two years in the job my employer wanted to send me to Birmingham University on a 4 years day release degree course, however there was one sticking point in that I didn't have the required university entry qualifications so I had to embark on 12 months of evening classes at my local college to retake Maths, English and a Science. Should have paid attention at school 
Once I had these it was off to University for the 4 years. Thankfully managed to get the degree and was just a case of sticking with it and working my way up to become a team manager some 17 years ago. I always said I would finish work before the age of 60 no matter what and consider myself lucky to have realised this at 58.
Ironically last week I was summoned for Jury Service, timing was impeccable so had to bring the leaving doo forward a week, I was a bit miffed at first but having now completed the Jury Service I actually enjoyed it and found it fascinating how the Courts system works.
So now I'm a free sole and really looking forward to pursueing new hobbies and pastimes and destressing without the daily grind. I haven't realistically been working for over a week now with doing the Jury Service and it's surprising how quickly work has faded away from my life, even when on a 2 week holiday work was never that far away in the background so now enjoying those work thoughts not being there anymore
Its quite a novelty.Tim.
Beat me by a year. I hung on until 59, why I will never know. It's been two years now and I have not looked back for one second. Get all the finances sorted and then simply enjoy retirement. 
