At the age of eleven she went to the nearest secondary school, the same one all the kids from the village went to, and though she had no friends, neither were there any more incidents of bullying or violence. She had no hobbies, no connection with the world beyond her love of television, something that I would worry about incessantly – I still loved her, you see, back then. So when she showed an interest in computers we were pleased, saving up to buy her a PC for her bedroom. I thought it could do no harm; when she spent more and more time alone in her room, I told myself that it was a good thing she’d found something she liked doing.

We never gave up trying, I want to make that clear: we never stopped trying to reach her, to make her feel loved and wanted. But the truth was she didn’t want our love. And when you’re met with hostility or indifference over and over it becomes almost impossible to keep on trying. My priority was my son, to make sure Hannah never had a chance to harm him again. Her spending her free time in her bedroom made that easier, I’ll admit.

I’ll always wonder I suppose if she was secretly planning what she went on to do. I like to think not; I like to think that she was happy, in her own way, or at least content during that time. But, truthfully, I think I’ve always known that my daughter is only ever really happy when she’s hurting others. If I’m honest I think, back then, she was just biding her time.

Our one joy during those years was Toby. Our funny, sunny little boy. As a pre-schooler, despite what she’d done, he would follow Hannah around like a baby duckling, his face lighting up whenever he saw her. But her active, clear dislike of him eventually took its toll and by the time he was five and she was eleven, he barely acknowledged her.

We rarely went out as a family; instead, either Doug or I would take Toby by ourselves, but despite everything, he grew up to be a happy, kind and loving little boy. We were extremely close, he and I. He told me he loved me every day, made me presents while he was at school. I loved him so much.

I remember him saying once, ‘Hannah hates me. She hates you and she hates Daddy.’ By then my heart had started to become less sensitive. ‘Well, Hannah is Hannah,’ I said. I didn’t try to hide it or deny it any more. ‘Her eyes are funny,’ he said. ‘They scare me.’ There was nothing I could say to that. He was right: there was a quality there, an absence I suppose you’d call it, that you didn’t want to dwell on for too long.