IT was one of the first sit-coms I ever saw.

I felt proud that my home city was on the telly each week as The Scaffold sang the jaunty theme song.

The Liver Birds was part of my youth and it holds a special place in the city's creative legacy.

I enjoyed interviewing the late co-creator Carla Lane who, with Myra Taylor, wrote it.

So why hasn't The Liver Birds ever been made into a musical?

That was the thought pattern that inspired writers Barb Jungr and George Seaton to team up with broadcaster and wordsmith Linda McDermott to hatch a play.

This production proves that is not an easy task.

Do you go all out for a story of whimsy and nostalgia accompanied by jukebox songs of the era?

Or do you create a soul-searching tale where two old friends look back on their flat-sharing days with more than a hint of melancholy while singing their hearts out with original songs?

Liver Birds Flying Home is a show of two separate concepts, which may work well on paper but does not nest well together on stage.

Sandra and Beryl now in their autumn years reunite after a chance meeting.

They look back at their swinging single days in Liverpool 8 working on a broken biscuit counter.

We rewind back and fast forward throughout the two and half hours.

There's plenty of catchy songs written by Barb Jungr and Mike Lindup of Level 42 fame.

Many have lyrics reminiscent of Carla's poetry while the music has echoes of Blood Brothers melodies.

It is a music centric show and the score is the real star.

The five-strong cast pull out all the emotional stops but more humour is needed to counter-balance too many sombre, sentimental scenes.

When you think of Liver Birds you envisage fun.

Wirral's Lucinda Lawrence is young Beryl and Lesley Molony is the older version who join Joanna Monro as old Sandra and Nicola Munns as her younger self.

The only male member of the crew is Mark Rice-Oxley who plays stressed business man Con as well as other cameo roles.

A very slick two-tier set in front of a Liverpool skyline backdrop becomes a church, an office, apartments and the Adelphi Hotel as well as the Pier Head.

Full marks to Mark Walters for design ingenuity and '70s costumes.

I support all our home-grown talent and the Royal Court for encouraging new writing.

It has a reputation for its laugh-out-loud productions.

It is important, therefore, to know that Liver Birds Flying Home - which premiered as a 'concert format' a year ago at the Epstein - is not an all-out comedy more a modern day Mersey melodrama with music.

The focus here is surprisingly on a fractured friendship - a subject that was explored by Carla in her later darker work.

To quote that other odd famous TV couple The Likely Lads, sometimes the only thing to look forward to in life is ... the past.

Bitter-sweet musical drama - three stars

The show is on until May 12

Tickets are from the box office on 0151 709 4321