And the very first time you get it right it feels even better. In those moments you feel like you've graduated, added another facet to your character, and opened up a whole new world of possibility.

Well, right now I feel about ten storeys high and won't stop smiling until well into next year because I've just driven our Caterham and held it sideways. Sometimes for whole seconds at a time.

Our Superlight R300 is the perfect car for learning and I've been hankering after a go in it for ages. This month road test ed Jethro finally relented, took the brave pills and offered to accompany me around that greatest of playgrounds, Bedford Autodrome, for the day.

After a couple of laps in the passenger seat watching a first class display of Bovingdon opposite lock, it was my go. First hurdle was wriggling my six-foot four-and-a-half inch frame into the driver's seat. Wedged under the dashboard, my knees are a bit close to my hands, which ensures some knuckle-kneecap interfacing, and a considerably different technique for heeling and toeing has to be devised. But where there's a will...

Surprisingly quickly I find I can hold the natural slides through the quicker corners, as you generally need no more than a quarter-turn of lock, which is easily administered. However, the hairpins and second-gear corners with their bigger angles prove somewhat harder and a series of frustrating pirouettes ensues, so it's back into the pits for some more sage words from Jethro. It turns out that I'm a) going into the corners a bit quick and b) waiting too long to get on the power, both common faults apparently. Out we go again.

Gradually, as the laps continue something starts to emerge. I get fleeting glimpses of it at first, like looking through curtains that don't quite meet in the middle. But then gradually I start to nail certain corners. And then, on one particular corner that I'd started to look forward to each lap, I get it. Throw the car in at just the right speed, stamp on the throttle, wheel to the stops, and feather to taste. And there I am, floating along holding a full-blown power oversteer slide all of my own doing. The sun's even shining.

Of course doing it once isn't enough, so a lot more time is then spent trying and quite frequently failing to repeat the feat. By the end of the day, however, I feel ecstatic. You might not see me whipping ass at drift competitions just yet, but there are certainly a couple of corners at Bedford that I'll take with a little more panache from now on.