My first taste of first class came at the tender age of 11, decades ago. My parents took my brother and me on a business trip to Hong Kong. A shambolic sort of family, predictably, we arrived late to the old Kai Tak airport for an overnight flight to New Zealand to see the grandparents on the way back home (clearly, Dad being a pioneer of bleisure travel).

Our four economy seats were long gone by the time we presented breathless at check-in, each lugging a heavy suitcase (back before they all had wheels); my mother pitifully waving our paper airline tickets, all stapled together in a fat wad.