Driving over Miss Daisy

Yesterday I met my ex driving instructor, purely by chance. We have parted ways many, many years ago under intricate and much multifaceted circumstances and as soon as I caught a glimpse of him I knew that this would be fun for me in ways I will never understand.
For those that are not familiar with my Achilles' heel...this is going to be an entertaining story, for those that know me well, you'll recoil right now as you think of my anguish.

"Have you passed your driving test?" became the question I detested the most of all the other questions, followed closely by "Have you got any children yet?", which, thank God, petered out as I became single 2 years ago.
But this one persists to this day, no matter how loathsome I find the whole thing by now.
Some 13 years ago I decided to learn to drive. I was like any ambitious, young person wanting to get a car. Things were simple then.
I found a driving instructor.
His name was David, he was about 50, with stern disposition and a white Micra that made my life a living hell.
The clutch became my biggest demise although I cannot say that I handled any part of a car with ease and confidence but I used to stall a lot.
With David's professional approach and coaching, 6 months went by and resulted in him straightforwardly telling me one day that he feels he will never be able to get me to the test standard and that he was not prepared to take my money anymore.
When someone is that eloquent with their feelings, there is little left to say or do.
We parted ways.
This is where Paul comes in. See, by now, aware that I had a predicament, a glitch in my otherwise perfectly tuned system, I rang several instructors and I debated my problem with the clutch, with 2 and 3 lane roundabouts, large vehicles, drivers that honk their horns at me because I take 10 minutes deciding to turn at the roundabout so on and so forth...
Paul seemed like he would endure the test of time. He appeared proficient, tolerant and chilled out and I decided he was the right choice.
He was about 30, with long hair and slightly hippy look and our relationship started to progress steadily at double lesson each Sunday.
I passed the written test with flying colours, doing it in under 20 minutes and with only 2 mistakes.
Things seemed to be going in my favour...

I am not sure at what point I realised that Paul was no longer committed to our relationship, but I get the impression that it was about 3.5 years into it. He was forcing me to take a test even though my 3-point turn took mere 15 minutes and I could adeptly park a meter away from the curb. But I mustered pulling up to a curb almost to perfection.
He would take all his frustrations out on me weekly by then, taking me to the largest 3 lane roundabout in Essex and making me decide myself when to take a chance to enter the furthest lane. Often he would have to take me home after that because I would be unable to drive myself, in tears and slowly becoming a nervous wreck. I started to dream that I am crashing a car, stealing someone's car and passing police van in the street...I used to wake, heavily covered in perspiration, imagining the cars beeping their horns at me...
Throughout this time, Paul became detached and bitter and I think the cup runeth over for him the day I asked him, while we drove in the traffic jam, what do the red lights on a car in front mean, coming on and off as it moved slowly.
He just put his head in his hands and was silent and I knew it was over.
He suggested I try an automatic and we parted. I never saw him again till yesterday, our eyes met in local Simsbury's and we smiled. No words. I could tell he knew I never passed that test, I could tell he could smell it. His knowing half smile said it all. There was no need for words, there, on the supermarket floor, polished to perfection...

I did not give up after that. Les, a man with an automatic car had a busy schedule. With 96% of his clientele being women, he was patient, firm and consistent. There were rules in his car.
I think he was the only guy that could handle me and I progressed quickly. He was immune to charm, humour and banter. He taught me to pay attention to road signs and speed limits, he would pose complex questions often and pull up suddenly if you didn't answer right to take his big, white, laminated board, on which he had drawn a large junction with several small roads.

Then he would look in the glove compartment for tiny cars he would place strategically on the board and he would always give you one to hold and drive up the junction showing him how would you do it differently. (I know this is highly irrelevant, but I always requested the green, old-fashioned convertible.)
He would wipe the board lovingly with one of those manly handkerchiefs that my granddad used to have.
It was increasingly difficult to keep a straight face, but hey, I was driving an automatic, pulling into furthest lanes on roundabouts just fine, not having to deal with the clutch and the gears, I even became more relaxed driving alongside busses and lorries, just occasionally having a feeling they will crush me. (Road kill movies have a lot to answer for)
I really believed that was it, but then Les moved away, or so he said.
I could not find another automatic instructor in the area and I lost interest by then. Maybe I never passed my driving test but I can drive. If I had to jump in a car, like they do in a film and run away from the crazed killer, I can do that. Sure, it might take me a minute to find a biting point, and the killer would have to be maimed in some way or gimpy in order to give me the time to get away, but I'd be fine, no doubt