The queues were long and winding, made up of an amazing mix of generations. Familiar faces, perplexed expressions, bored Spanish-speaking couples probably from some nearby English Language school, bemused youngsters with nowhere else to go on a dull February evening and nauseating whiffs of overheated frankfurters and chips.

We were all waiting and looking forward to an evening of nostalgia with the Bootleg Beatles at the Eden Arena. Lennon and McCartney music remains as fresh as when it was first penned decades ago in plain, suburban Liverpool homes and misty London studios, but most of us knew we were also actually in for a bumper masquerade in which four ageless but talented imitators have long been successfully paying tribute to the Fab Four who, since splitting in 1970 and embarking on their solo careers, have over the years been sadly and tragically reduced to two.

But is going to watch such grand spectacles of mimicry, in which one’s passion “for the good old days” is exploited in a way that sometimes verges on the pathetic, worth both the effort and the money spent? I have always been reluctant to go and see copies of the real thing, though when I did, such as at Orlando’s “Epcot Centre” where – within minutes – one can walk from a Mexican environment into Venice, Paris and typical English and African villages, there was the sheer wonderment of how exact and detailed they were. But the real thing is the real thing. Las Vegas has its own astonishing copy of Michaelangelo’s masterpiece he painted on the vault of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, but who would dare give it more or equal value?

Perhaps it is different with evergreen music such as that of the Beatles’. Inside the Bay Street arena that once was an indoor ice-rink, a cold and hesitant start to the concert probably had the four Beatles poseurs visibly worried, until the crowd and the beer, or possibly the beer and the crowd, started warming up. They reacted with an upsurge of adrenaline and an impressive exhibition of music-playing, assisted and abetted by highly talented members of the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the National Orchestra. One lady musician in particular, had most of us mesmerised with her versatility and on-stage joviality.

Ever the social gazer, I kept track of the different generations filling up the seats and standing zones of the arena. There were middle-aged couples, clearly reliving the golden days of their youth when listening and dancing to Beatles music was, incredibly, a source of concern for some parish priests and village elders at the time. Enjoying the staid and bland fare of the likes of Perry Como or Andy Williams would have been more in tune with those people’s attitude to life. Thank goodness for them, by the time rock music evolved into heavy metal they were already somewhere else listening to the stress-less strains of music in the beyond.

There were also the not-so-young who do not exactly remember Beatlemania, having just missed all the fun and furore of the Swinging Sixties. They seemed to be a very appreciative segment of the audience, easily recognising the first notes of each and every song played by the Bootleg Beatles, except when the players on stage intentionally threw in the beginning of a Monkees hit as a lark by way of referring to 1967 and, even more playfully, a silly Paul McCartney song about his queen, written in recent years.

Then there were the kids who simply wanted to see what it was really all about that their parents and grandparents so often refer to with unfailing enthusiasm over lunch or sitting-room drinks. They were obviously less eager to stand up, clap and sing and holler for more when the concert came to its end. But they must have felt something, or so I could I see from half-a-metre away.

Exactly in front of us sat two very young couples who initially must have asked what they had let themselves into that evening. The girls, however, seemed to know most of the melodies and there were moments when they actually clapped and sang. The boys preferred to sit and watch, evidently wary their girlfriends should be caught doing so in such an adult scene. It is probably why they went several times to get the beers in which to drown their growing bewilderment.

It was certainly a glittering affair, especially when the backlights shone brightly into the forest of bald patches that once, four decades ago, must have sported sumptuous Beatles mops.

As we slowly and contentedly came out of the arena at the end of the concert, I could not help remarking loudly that Bay Street could not possibly have ever witnessed such an overwhelming presence of middle-aged ladies and gentlemen at that particular post-midnight hour. It was a harmless little comment meant to indulge in some self-amusement as all sorts of people pushed past us, some acknowledging the night was still young while the rest most likely could not wait to be back home to the telly, slippers and bed.

A lady of a certain age and a certain height who happened to be behind us heard my comment.

“Yeah,” (a Beatles fan has to say yeah, of course) she retorted loudly as the fresh air greeted us outside, “it’s like coming out of church after Mass on a Sunday.”

I had no answer to that. Does life really go that full a circle, I wonder? So I just laughed back loudly. With my no less bemused wife in tow, and still humming Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, we quickly walked back to our car. Tomorrow, we’ll tell it all to our kids who, this time, were simply not bothered. Perhaps they will be one day when it’s time to have a Take That tribute group playing for a Maltese audience...