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In thirteen years, every aspect of the universe can change - ask a thirteen-year-old.

I think everyone still thinks I'm 13.

Sometimes I can't believe I'm going to be 60. I always say there's no point moaning about getting older, when there's nothing you can do about it. But still, I do find it quite funny. I look at that number, 60, and I think, 'Really? Me?'

I know that might sound silly coming from someone my age, but I remember on my 14th birthday having a crisis like my mom should be having. I kept thinking that I was getting older, and I haven't really accomplished anything. I remember thinking that I better accomplish something real soon.

I always imagined that magically, at some point, I would settle into this very easy and refined sophistication, but it turns out that who you are at eleven is pretty much who you are at 27, so I don't know how much I've learned over the years.

At 13 years old, I was doing grown-man things, so I know who I am, and I'm telling people who I am.

But I think it's more that when you're young, you're invincible, you're immortal - or at least you think you are. The possibilities are limitless, you're inventing the future. Then you get older and suddenly you have a history. It's fixed. You can't change anything. I find that a bit disturbing, to be honest.

When I turned about 12 or 13, I realised that being funny wasn't about remembering jokes. It was about creating them.

When you're 13, you're still trying to figure out your style.

What I try to do for my readers is to pass on some of the things that I found out about being thirteen after doing it for forty years.