19 ways you know you were a teen of the ‘90s

THAT Joey and Pacey kiss shocked you. You know who Joey and Pacey are. And Nirvana ruled everything. Here’s a bunch of evidence you were a 90s teen.

THE decade kicked off with a recession and the fall of the Berlin Wall and culminated in the dotcom boom, but for teens of the time, the 1990s will always have a special kind of cringe-worthy nostalgia.

1. You fretted over how many butterfly clips to put in your hair to go to that weekend’s party.

2. You binge-watched Dawson’s Creek and dreamt of the day that you could genuinely play I Don’t Wanna Wait with your own very own Pacey.

Admit it, it was shocking when Joey and Pacey kissed on Dawson's Creek. How could she do that to Dawson?

3. You were an Origami master when it came to folding letters to give to your friends in English class. Said letters were usually about Pacey and how you were certain that if you could just go on exchange to LA, you were sure you could meet him. Oh, and Charlie from Mighty Ducks while you’re there, too.

4. You would never admit it out loud but life was a constant handwriting battle as you tried perfect the twirls and love hearts dotting your i’s better than all of your friends.

5. You made a habit of writing the word K backwards. Just like your favourite band Korn … which you didn’t actually listen to, but all the hot boys did, so you made sure you covered your schoolbooks in the tag.

6. You still mosh to Smells Like Teen Spirit whenever you hear it.

Admit it. You saw this poster of Nirvana and started moshing. You may also possibly be crowd-surfing right now.

Don’t deny it, you totally know where this baby is from.

7. Rip Curl and Billabong were the height of fashion, but since your parents wouldn’t fork out for all that j’aton, you’d be stuck in Bad Girl and Piping Hot. On a lucky day you’d ransack the surf shop sale racks to find anything emblazoned with a bold surf logo.

8. If you weren’t a goth, you were scared of them.

9. You poured litres of sun-in into your hair in the hope of having blonde highlights just like the models on the cover of Dolly.

Yep, that’s Miranda Kerr, on the front of Dolly, in the 90s.

You watched all the kids in your school with money wear these while you wore Piping Hot because that’s all you could afford.

10. For a quicker fix, blonde or blue hair mascara did the (sticky) trick for streaks.

11. You recorded Rick Dees’ Weekly Top 40 on your tape deck, pausing at the precise spot to skip his voice and ads so you’d have an awesome mix tape of chart-toppers to play at sleepovers.

12. There were blue tack stains on your bedroom walls when you eventually moved out, thanks to years of posters of Leo DiCaprio, Devon Sawa and JTT ripped from TV Hits staring down at you.

13. You still recruit a group of five to dress up as Spice Girls at every costume party you’re invited to. And you never want to be Sporty.

You made us fly Jack. We won’t let go.

You’ve, given it everything, all that joy can bring ... And you still do. It’s 2015 and you still work that Spice Girls costume at parties.

14. Pre-mobile phones meant using Home Link to call home for free from public phones when you needed to be picked up.

15. You knew you’d made it when you got a Hypercolor T-shirt that changed colour with heat.

16. You got a Topsy Tail for your birthday with an accompanying video (VHS style) with cool hairstyles you could do.

17. Encarta practically meant Google.

18. Nothing looked better than tencel jeans with Doc Martens, which you were able to convince your parents to buy because they lasted forever.

Hypercolour: Those handprints got awkward. Just saying.

The only thing better than Hypercolor was a pair of Docs go with the shirt.

19. “Stop tying up the phone line!” was the nightly screech from your parents after you’d spent hours on dial-up internet looking up bands or emailing your friends’ Hotmail. Only possible after logging onto the IBM using MS Dos, of course.