It's all a bit sad, really.

You would think someone of my age (43 at the time of writing) would know better, perhaps spending my spare time learning a foreign language or discussing world affairs - but no. That would be too easy.

Instead, I took a strange, unpredictable and decidedly weird road into a world I had never dreamed existed, a world populated by delightful lunatics to whom the phrase 'Must be a chick thing' means twenty minutes of unadulterated hysteria, and whose hearts palpitate at the mere mention of Dylan Thomas.

Now I never meant for this to happen. Honest. I blame Bill Gates.

Well, actually, I'm getting ahead of myself a bit, so perhaps I should explain.

Y'see - I am a Ronaholic.

A Ron fan. A person addicted to Ron. You know the guy - Ron Perlman. Big fella with beautiful blue eyes, a white, toothy grin that sends your heart thudding into your feet and a voice that you could bottle and use as an aphrodisiac. Oh, and acting talent that fills that big rangy body of his all the way from his lovely curly hair to those size thirteen boots - oh dear. There I go again. I really must get a grip.

It started innocently enough, as all addictions do.

Now this is where Sean Connery comes into the equation, because - along with Bill Gates, whose involvement I will explain in due course - I put the blame squarely on those broad Scottish shoulders. If he had not made a film called 'Name of the Rose', a medieval murder mystery that instantly aroused my passion as an amateur medievalist and lover of illuminata, then said Mr Perlman would never have impinged on my consciousness.

I knew the book well, and I was curious as to how the hunchback Salvatore would be portrayed, so I waited patiently in the flickering darkness, enjoying the atmosphere and grim reality of the film, and then … and then … there HE was. Salvatore. A shambling, babbling wreck of a man, half-mad, snaggle-toothed, scrofulous, his cackling cry of 'Penitenziagite!!!' had me riveted to the screen. I watched the film open-mouthed, the sheer presence of this unknown actor knocking me breathless. As the final credits rolled, I feverishly searched for a name.

Aha!!!

Ron Perlman.

Never heard of him.

But definitely a name to be noted. I wandered home, delighted and amazed, and swore I would look out for Mr Perlman in anything else I could find. It took me a year, and the next time I saw him I knew I was onto something.

A new television series called 'Beauty and the Beast' began; a bit of an oddity, we the viewers were told. A strange half-man, half-beast living in the tunnels beneath New York City, a scholar, a poet, gentle and kind, yet with the ferocity of a lion and the heart of a great warrior if anyone threatened the innocent and the weak. His name? Vincent. The very name conjured up an anguished soul, and anguished Vincent certainly was, this handsome, noble leonine character whose love for his Catherine, a beautiful Assistant District Attorney, transcended all earthly barriers. And she loved him too.

Ohhh, the romance! The music! The classical literature! The sheer sexiness of the thing had me glued to the screen. It ensured my rapt attention for three years, and there he was - Ron Perlman. And I still didn't know what he looked like, dammit.

Sadly, Beauty and the Beast ended, and I slipped back into Real Life, totally unaware that somewhere out there in the world beyond was a swell of Fandom that persists to this day - but more of that later.

And so, dear readers, I puttered along, carrying on with my life, my very tolerant husband and I settling back into a Perlmanless routine, and enjoying our shared love of all things cinematic. Life was good.

Until 1997, that is. The beginning of my downfall was waiting in the shadows, and the name of that downfall was Crewman Johner.

As fans of the 'Alien' series, Hubby and myself dutifully turned up to see the film, a little sceptical that it would be any good because the third film in the series had been abysmal. But as the theatre darkened and the opening credits began to come up, I noticed a name. Ron Perlman. Oh-ho! This was a turn-up for the books! My Hubby poked me in the ribs.

"Isn't that the fella from Beauty and the Beast?" The stage whisper had members of the audience shushing him in irritation.

"Yes, it is, so be quiet! I'm finally going to see what he looks like!"

As the film unfolded I carefully searched the screen for someone big with blue eyes. Nope. Not him. Eyes are brown. That can't be him … voice is too light, and anyway, he's too short. Hmmm. Where is he? And then I heard the gibbering ape noises, and my heart plummeted. Everyone else had already been on screen, so this had to be Ron. The camera panned up, and a figure resolved from the shadows - big, certainly. Muscles all over the place. But … but he was ugly!!! Scarred, his hair cropped short and suffering from a severe attack of patchiness, Johner was a foul-mouthed, abusive, snarling, non-PC thug.

And within five minutes I loved him to bits.

He was so deliciously appalling. Over the next two hours or so I watched not only Ron, but the effect he had on the audience - watched how they straightened every time he made an appearance, laughed at the succinct one-liners, and delighted in every scowl, sneer, leer and expletive he came out with. That big, powerful frame was used to frightening effect, he invaded the other characters' body space with threatening ferocity - why, he could even make a wink appear menacing! He dominated the screen with his presence and, quite frankly, acted the socks off the rest of the impressive cast. I was hooked.

But after Alien Rez he did it again. Disappeared from view. Gone. Vamoosed. Little did I know that Ron was working away like a beaver in the States on movies and television guest spots, none of which saw the light of day here in the UK.

So I was bereft once more. Ronless.

And this is where Bill Gates comes in, for it is on his doorstep I lay the blame for the whole sorry mess.

I was finally dragged, kicking and screaming, into the twenty-first century with the purchase of a computer with Internet access, and after figuring out how to switch the contraption on, I was off like a greyhound out of the slips!

I tackled glitches with gusto, learned what 'de-frag' meant, and began to surf with a vengeance. At that point I was an innocent, blessing Bill Gates for inventing all of this stuff that enabled me to see the webcam at Loch Ness and learn about dairy farming in Hokkaido. This was terrific fun!!!

But then the whispers began, those teeny tiny voices that start somewhere in the ol' grey cells that have something to do with obsessive behaviour. "Rooon …" they said, insidious and conniving, "loook for Rooon …" The voices were very persuasive. So I typed Ron Perlman into the little box thingy - and just about fell off my computer chair. The list of Ron Perlman related sites was endless!!! So, well-trained archivist that I am, I began to sift through the list in a methodical fashion, and became intrigued - he had been in another TV series called 'The Magnificent Seven'! A western series! My favourite!!! And then I discovered fan fiction! Ohhhh!!!! Lovely! I soon became a devoted fan of Josiah Sanchez, erstwhile preacher, gunfighter and tortured soul, without ever having seen the series.

And so I began to write. My first story went on-line, and then I was invited to join a mailing list for Josiah's character. I wrote some more. Made friends who also went THUD! at the mention of Ron's baby blues. I was on the long, downward spiral towards Ronaholicism. It grabbed me tight and wouldn't let go. It was wonderful.

Then I became hungry for more information, and one of the list members, Val 'Knower of All Things Ron', took me firmly in hand and fed that hunger with a steady stream of videos of Ron's work, interviews, Con appearances - you name it, Val threw it at me to ingest. We would chat (and still do - it costs us a fortune) on the phone about the Big Guy, and email each other constantly.

Then Val, ol' Pal o' mine, said in an aside one evening -

"You should talk to Pat Paone. You know Pat - does Ron's site, the Perlman Pages."

I gasped in admiration. THE Site. I gibbered to myself. I had always been far too shy to contact Pat, who so lovingly follows Ron's career and makes sure we're all up to date on what he's up to.

"Oh, for goodness sake, stop gibbering," my dear friend said. "I'll mail her and tell her you can write."

I strictly forbade her to do so. Val being the sensible lady she is, ignored me and contacted Pat anyway. Pat, bless her heart, took me under her wing and set me to work doing reviews, knowing full well that I was only happy, quiet and less troublesome if I was contemplating Ron and his career.

And so my final descent began. The inexorable slide into total lunacy that has changed me from a staid, sensible, rather boring historian into a shuffling, muttering nutcase - a woman who spent four and a half months hassling her local video store to sell her its only copy of 'Primal Force', and then spent another two weeks trying to figure out what kind of weaponry Ron's character Frank Brodie used for a web site review.

I sat there, winding and rewinding the tape, my Jane's Infantry Weapons of 1986 clutched tightly in my hot little hands (the book was a present from my dear Hubby, who tolerates my obsession with barely controlled amusement). Was that an M16-A1 or A2??? Hmmmm. Decisions, decisions …

So, that's the situation so far. I must admit to being deliriously happy in my madness, although I have far more grey hairs that I used to. Now those I can blame on Ron and no one else - I think I'm getting ahead on reviews and suchlike, and heave a sigh of relief when they're all up to date; then what does he do? Makes another film, that's what!!!! Doesn't the man ever stop working?

Still, I can't complain really. I've walked the ruins of Stalingrad with Koulikov and slurped hooch laced with battery acid with Johner; I've read Great Expectations with Vincent, laughed myself silly at Cliff's impersonations, and been entranced with the sympathetic monster that is Jerry Paul; I've listened to the whales sing with One, seen Josiah fight against his inner demons, and I've yelled at the wonderfully sexy Frank Brodie to get up off his backside and get into the damn boat more times than I care to mention.

I have made wonderful friends, all of whom are card-carrying Ronaholics like me, and I sincerely haven't laughed so much in years. It has been - and still is, thank God - tremendous fun.

So, if you're ever in Aberdeen, Scotland, and see a tall, shambling wreck of a woman tottering along Union Street wearing a tee shirt that says 'Hey, I'm not the mechanic here, ironsides - I mostly just hurt people!', don't worry. I'm harmless. Mostly. In fact, stop me for a chat if you have a mind to, as long as you don't mind talking about the latest Ron Perlman movie.

"So, friend - what do you think of Ron's gun in Blade Two, then? Pretty cool, huh …"

See what I mean? Sad. Totally, irrevocably, undeniably sad …

Feedback welcome at MASKS2003@hotmail.com