I suppose you could call this my rather belated contribution to Ada Lovelace Day, “an international day of blogging to draw attention to women excelling in technology”. In fact, I was going to post it on the 24th, but I was a little worried that it might be considered irreverent to contribute a bit of nonsense about a fictitious woman when there are so many real women whose contributions to technology have yet to be properly acknowledged. (I was also going to post it as an Amazon review, in the grand tradition of spoof Amazon reviews, but unfortunately that’s no longer as easy as it once was.)

But while this is obviously meant to be tongue-in-cheek, it’s also fanfiction, with the emphasis on fan. Mavis Beacon actually did teach me to type – although she was rather more computerised than she is in the story. It was so long ago, in fact, that I don’t think the graphics were up to Mavis herself even making an appearance in the game. I certainly remember wondering what she looked like, imagining from the “Mavis” that she was an grey-haired stalwart of the typing pool – as kindly as she was sharp, despite her age. (Yeah, I needed to get out more.) So it was a bit of a surprise when she was eventually revealed to be an attractive young woman of colour. But at least I wasn’t taken as much by surprise as the poor souls who thought she was real…

And the legal bit: I don’t own the character of Mavis Beacon or the phrase “Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing”. This is a non-profit work of fan fiction written for the entertainment of myself and hopefully others.