I first saw Kathryn outside Michael Harth's flat, 1990ish, where she was efficiently extracting Elsa’s wheelchair from their car and helping Elsa into it. ‘No!’, she didn’t need any help … which made me a bit wary of her. Once the afternoon workshop was underway, I was awed by the knowledgeable, authoritative opinions of these two women.

Little did I know that they, with Michael and Donald and other-early GAW members, had been involved in the first years of setting-up the group, the years of lively campaign via street-stalls, drama-performances and readings, that invited and encouraged gay-writers to come out of the shadows and write … and publish … and always Kathryn was there helping Elsa.

They met in Africa. Elsa was bought up there, viz. the collection of her Musungu stories which Kathryn lovingly ‘translated’ over a couple of years (did you ever see Elsa’s pencilled-printing?!) and prepared for publication.

Kathryn accompanied her father and mother to Africa as a teenager, I assume, when they left their home in Glasgow, and for some time, she was employed as a police-woman. But it was nineteen years before she and Elsa were finally able set up home in London and eventually move to 111B Windsor Road.

By the time I visited Kathryn and Elsa at home, Elsa was ensconced in a hospital bed in the front-room and Kathryn did all the to-ing and fro-ing from kitchen to lounge; Kathryn’s care for Elsa continued until the day she died, in 2018. The cat was ever present. Cats were great favourites with both women.

The next time I visited Kathryn she had set up a table in the living-room and prepared lunch. I admired the embroidery on the tablecloth, which was beautifully worked, and learnt that the two of them had done the embroidery … consequently, when I mentioned my knitting or sewing, Kathryn was interested in the details and I sent her photographs of the finished objects.

Kathryn’s workshops at no. 111B were lovingly prepared: her menu was related to me in advance, then, how many members came, how many read, if the food was enjoyed and whether there were any leftovers for her meals the following week. She made me feel part of it all. Peter and Hastie joined her for her 90th birthday and Hastie sent photos of the happy occasion. Kathryn was a great present-giver. Each item was wrapped and tied with a length of saved-ribbon; the whole package was tied with knotted pieces of string, not stuck-about with Sellotape like my missives. At Christmas, I was one of her friends who received three bunches of jonquils, fresh from the Scilly Islands, the perfume …!

Meanwhile Kathryn enjoyed writing her own meaningful short-stories. She would rage when her computer malfunctioned because her every day was spent either assembling the GAW newsletter from submissions, assembling the Gemma newsletter, writing to members, writing to friends, admitting new members, managing the subscriptions and other moneys, proof-reading book-submissions and etc; then there was the folding of printed-newsletters for envelopes and stamping, the emailing, the printing of large-text copies, the posting of them, and when all that was done, there was the Gemma newsletter to write, to print and to read onto tape.

Elsa’s brother Tom and his wife, still living in Africa, kept in touch with Kathryn and they exchanged phone calls, books and parcels.

Our email correspondence just happened before Elsa died because Kathryn used to include her comments, but it’s been daily since then and I’m astonished to realise that we’ve been writing for seven years. Great anxiety on both our parts if either of us defaulted until the reason was explained … our ages were 84 at the start and when she came out of hospital a few weeks ago, she wrote, ‘This is it.’

She did enjoy a lunch out recently with some of her friends and travelled there and back by taxi.

The hesitant progress on her last newsletter made Kathryn’s emails sad. She worried that she had become too ill to finish it, or safely walk to the post office. Her last attempt which should have taken thirty-or-so minutes took two and a half hours … she used to sit on the church, and any other available wall, to summon strength for the next few steps.

We talked flowers that appeared each season in our gardens, the wonderful Camellia-tree flowering each Spring in Windsor Road, the Christmas lights she enjoyed on a winter-evening walkabout, the neighbours’ festival celebrations and particularly setting up her own Christmas display on windowsill and bookshelf. She reported the progress of upstairs-neighbour Stephen once he began his new garden. We talked the heavy weight of fat-balls and bags-of-seed for the birds and she chid me for trying to carry them myself.

And how she enjoyed the lively Jacqui Lawson animated cards that I sent her for every possible occasion. Hallowe’en was perhaps her favourite because of the fairies, witches and cats but she downloaded the Christmas Advent Calendar with enthusiasm and had the puzzles done and rooms decorated before I opened my copy.

Kathryn’s day ended at two or three the next morning! Workmen who rang at 8am, or previously arranged morning-appointments caused her panic. I’m not sure if she had an alarm-clock. When Stephen kindly phoned to tell me that Kathryn had gone into hospital, I was relieved, as I’m sure were all the GAW members: the thought of her fiercely independent spirit, making it possible that she would collapse when alone, was a worry. ‘I can hardly drag myself from one room to another,’ she wrote.

I miss her. To whom can I tell my stories of family news, my discoveries from documentaries on the telly, which old film impressed me. With whom can I tussle about religion and philosophy? Sadly, she has taken her immense knowledge and loving kindness elsewhere.

Beth Lister

Beth Lister is a doyenne of the Gay Authors Workshop. She has published several volumes of stories which are available as e-books via Paradise Press.