I’ve never liked my first name. Yvette. I’ve always wanted to have an ordinary name. One that people know how to spell would be good. And, after 56 years, there are some members of my family who still get it wrong. I just grin and bear it now because I learned a long time ago that there’s no point in correcting people. To remind them that my name begins with a ‘Y’ and not an ‘E’ – or even an ‘I’ – very rarely works.

I was in my early teens when I asked Mum where my name came from and she proudly told me the story of how she chose my name. In fact, it’s a story that she’s since repeated many times to my friends and all I can do is smile weakly or laugh along with them. She thinks it’s sweet. And, from the way that she tells it, I don’t think Dad had any say on the matter. Originally, it had been decided that I would be Sonia if a girl, or Nigel if a Boy. However, Mum felt that the name Sonia added to my then surname Stevens, would be ‘…too many s’s…’ (her words), and so she started to find an alternative.

A friend of my mum’s came up with the idea of where to get my name from. Mum worked in a hosiery factory, making socks, and worked with Molly. Molly bought my mum a baby gift. It was a pram bedding set – something that Mum used to refer to as a ‘layette’ – and the brand name was ‘Yvette’. Mum must have told Molly that she wasn’t sure about the name Sonia and so Molly suggested that the brand name would be perfect. Mum agreed with her and so, when mum found out that I was a girl, that’s what she named me. In later years my mum would proudly say that she had named me after a brand of blanket rather than a layette. To me either is embarrassing and doesn’t make it sound a romantic or sentimental reason, which was what I’d imagined as a young girl.

Because, before hearing the story, I had always thought that my name was linked to my maternal grandmother. Her name was Renee, and she had been born in 1916 in Leicester to Thomas and Kate. I knew that her name was of French origin and so I imagined that the reason I was given a French name (and spelt in the French way), was my mum acknowledging her mother – my grandma. I knew that there was no connection to names on Dad’s side of the family. Even though I was the first girl to be born in my dad’s immediate family since 1913, his mum was Edna. Definitely not French. Once I heard the blanket story, any dream that it had been a sentimental gesture was completely crushed.

And then I looked at the meaning of the name, which was another disappointment. It is linked to the Yew tree, which represents longevity and is traditionally the preferred wood to make bows from. So, my name means Yew or Archer. Again, not quite what I was hoping for. Although I can hope that the link to longevity might mean that I will live to a good age!

Mum also argued that the name is a good choice because it can’t be shortened. But I quickly found out that, children can turn any name into something that they can ridicule. So, by the time I started going to high school, I was known as Yeti. In a child’s mind, if you take the ‘v’ out of the name you get Yette and this was quickly turned into Yeti. Not a flattering name for someone who was not the slimmest girl in the class and only 5ft tall. Teachers didn’t help either. Often I would be called Y-Vet. One teacher, who obviously thought they were funny, would often say to me ‘Y-Vet your dog when you can take it to the doctors?’ He would say it loudly with the intention that others in the class would hear and they would join in with the laughing too. And, for some reason, even now people will say it. Perhaps they because they find it’s a useful way of remembering how to spell the name – they don’t seem to be laughing at me – but I still find it annoying, although I never tell them.

Some people can’t get the hang of my name at all. Often I am called Yvonne instead of Yvette. And for those who apologise when they realise their mistake, I simply smile or laugh it off. When I worked in telesales the phrase ‘Wide Range Engineering Services. Yvette speaking’, often had people thinking I was called ‘Suzette’. Like the crepes. The most awkward time was when I went on holiday with my husband about thirty years ago to Majorca. We met another couple at the bar one evening and, for some reason, we never formally introduced ourselves. So, we worked out – through conversation – the names of the other couple, but it soon dawned on me that they had started to call me Claire. They seemed to have worked out that my husband was called David, but when I heard the question ‘What would you like to drink Claire?’ and realised that it was being addressed to me, I simply answered: “A gin and tonic please.”

The evening went on and still they were calling me ‘Claire’, and they carried on with it for the rest of the week. But the thing was that I hadn’t got the heart to correct them. And David didn’t seem bothered by it either. It came to a point where we both found it funny. After all, if we’d introduced ourselves properly, it wouldn’t have happened. They were such a lovely couple, and we had some good evenings chatting with them and playing cards. Particularly because – as I remember – the hotel was in a remoter part of the island and there wasn’t much else to do in the resort after dark. Finally, after seven days of what was an okay holiday, we found ourselves on the bus back to the airport. And as we parted ways in the terminal, our new friend called back to me ‘Bye Claire! Lovely to meet you both!’. I agree, it had been a lovely meeting, but we haven’t kept touch. It was one of those holiday acquaintances that usually dies out when you get back home to reality.

But then the name Claire seemed to stick. I was working for an Engineering/Power Tools Supply company as a customer liaison assistant (more about that in a later blog) and had to make sales calls to regular customers. It was a good job that needed me to build friendly relationships with people. The customers were usually builders, or engineering companies and we had regular people doing their buying. One new account I was allocated had a nice guy who I would speak to on the telephone. As we got chatting, which always came before I took the order, he suddenly said laughingly, ‘I don’t like calling you Yvette. You remind me of my first wife. She was awful but you sound nice’. Of course I laughed with him. It was the nature of the job I did and so casually said to him, ‘why not call me Claire?’ And I told him the holiday story and the misunderstanding over my name.

And that was it. The name stuck with him. Any time that he called to put an order through or needed help with spares he would always ask for ‘Claire’. Of course, I had to let my supervisor and colleagues know what was happening in case his call came through on their phones, but they were happy to go along with it and, thankfully, there wasn’t another Claire in the company. My boss was also pleased about it. It kept the customer happy, and we regularly got some nice value orders. It was only when I went on maternity leave that my alter ego ‘Claire’ left the company. She never returned.

But being called an alternate name has recently been regenerated. I belong to a quiz team, and we successfully take part in a weekly quiz at our local. It’s a great atmosphere and I love it that I can call many of them my friends. When I started to get to know one of the bar staff I introduced myself, but she still would often forget what my name was. One evening she confessed to me that she ‘…just cannot get your name right’. She didn’t feel that the name matched my personality. I told her about ‘Claire’ and said that I would be happy to be called that, but she shook her head. Apparently that didn’t suit me either. So, we chatted, and I retold the story of how I got my name. When I mentioned my mum’s first choice of Sonia, she stopped me. ‘That’s it!’ she said. ‘You’re Sonia!’ And once again I find myself answering to a different name than the one that is clearly written on my birth certificate.

‘Yvette Stevens’. That’s what’s there in black and white. No middle name. Just a Christian name (or forename if you prefer), Apparently my mum didn’t think I needed any more names because Yvette ‘was enough on its own’. And I know that my grandma Renee didn’t have a middle name either, but I feel that she was an exception to the rule in the early twentieth century. When I was growing up, I often asked my friends what their middle names were. I was envious of them and constantly wished that I could have one. Of course, I know now that I could add a middle name if I wished. No one would stop me. But, at that time, I knew my mum would be offended and hurt if she believed that I was trying to change something that she felt she had put a lot of thought into.

At the age of about six or seven, my solution to the lack of a middle name was to christen my favourite doll ‘Louise’. I don’t know why I chose that name, it wasn’t anything to do with a book or TV programme. At that time all I read was Enid Blyton and none of the Famous Five or Secret Seven were called Louise. But I somehow felt that, if I could choose a name for me, that would be the one. And reflecting on it now; Yvette Louise has quite a nice ring to it. Don’t you think? However, now, it no longer seems important to me. When completing forms at least I have less to add than others when a full name is requested.

Now – over 50 years later – I’m still not keen on my name. Perhaps it’s the number of times I repeat myself when on a phone call or the way that it is mis-spelt or mispronounced as much now as when I was younger. Having recently started writing – and I hope that one day I might be a published novelist – I wonder if I should use a pseudonym. Louise Clare perhaps or even Sonia Clare? But then…

What’s in a name?