I came across an old laptop in the attic, not been used for many years, I decided to see if it worked.It took its time to start and made some strange noises and finally, Windows XP loaded up.

I browsed through the laptop, finding some old photographs and videos I had completely forgotten about. I then found something that surprised me.

I had a list of websites bookmarked, websites I regularly visited when I was younger, I decided to have a look and see if the website and my accounts still existed.

The first on the list was Neopets.

What is Neopets?
The website is a hub, with a virtual planet with fantasy lands inhabited by Neopets and other virtual creatures. Each land has a different theme, such as pirates or prehistory, and its shops, games, and attractions.
You must take care of your Neopet and let it grow, and interact with other Neopets in the world

This brought back a lot of memories and was excited to see if my account was still there, I put in an old email address and attempted to remember the password I might have used. I clicked the log in button and…
The password was wrong, after a few attempts I gave up, but something happened. It loaded up my account via my email, and there was my Neopet (Shylo Wing). I could not do anything with the account without my password, but my account was still there.

I tried the second website on my list. Myspace.

What is Myspace?
MySpace is a social media platform, where you could create custom profiles, add friends, send messages and no matter what, Tom would be a friend.

I remember spending so much time creating my profile, messaging friends, and listening to music, I was looking forward to seeing my account.
I entered my email as before, then the password and nothing, sadly it didn’t recognise my email or password.
While I was disappointed that I did not write my emails and passwords with the website list, I did have an idea.

I searched my username, and I found myself. My profile was still there, it didn’t look how I remembered it, but it still had my photographs and even some friends. While it may have only been 12 friends, which I think at the time I had 100, I was still impressed. And of course, Tom was still one.

I clicked on my friend’s profiles and had to save some photographs from their profile and tag them on Facebook. It was a great feeling seeing everything, it was like it was frozen in time, just waiting.

I remembered so many different things looking back at the photographs, and people I lost contact with. Which I have now reached out too, it was a great experience looking back at these websites.

I did have plenty more websites on the list, which I will do in another blog, but I wanted to share these two for now. What websites did you use when you were a child, were you on myspace, Neopets? Are your accounts still there?