Not whether I should adopt some mysterious nome de plume, but whether I should take on the surname of my new husband.

Saddled with a name that has been misheard as Cora Lout, Laura Cloud and Nora Trout, you might think I would be keen to ditch it.

The Italian softness of ‘Laura Manzi’ certainly rolls off the tongue better.

But for me, especially as a journalist, my name is a vital to my sense of identity.

Like a stick of Brighton rock, the name Clout runs right through me.

To give it up at the altar seems so terribly old-fashioned, part of a tradition in which women were chattels to be handed to their new ‘owners’.

There is the double-barreled option of course (facetious friends have also suggested Cloumanzi and Manlout), but I can’t help but feel it sounds pretentious.

I could instead be Mrs Manzi at the school gates and Ms Clout at work – but I fear troubled encounters with bank managers or pass

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I can spend hours putting the world to rights, I pick up litter when I’m out and about, ask my younger sister to translate words like ‘phat’ and ‘neek’ for me - and I say things like ‘out and about’ for goodness sake.

When I look at teenagers I either feel the need to tell them how beautiful they are, my tears welling at the innocent excitement and hope in their eyes…

Or, I order them to turn their music down, get their feet off the train seats and mind their Ps and Qs.

I don’t know how to charge my iPod, can’t be bothered with the pain of high heels, and have just invested in a pair of his and hers Thermos flasks.

At this rate it won’t be long before I’m inexplicably drawn to beige.

Unless someone comes up with Botox for the brain, there is clearly not much I can do about my steady totter towards grannyness.

But perhaps being a Yoldie (young oldie) is not so bad after all.

I don’t have to agonise

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