Very orange eh? Maybe I should consider the natural wood version. I'll see them in the flesh and decide.
Manchester eh? Martin too! Might bump into you at some point. If I'm about I may go to the drum show. I've also swapped a few emails with the Manchester Drum Centre. You any experience of them?
VERY bright orange. Mine was a Mapex. I can't speak for Yammies. You'd probably be as well trying to catch a set in the flesh. Or just do what I always do and say "sod it" and go with the ride.
I purchased my Mapex Honey Amber kit from Manchester Drum Centre by coincidence. Way back they were superb. I haven't been in for a while but they have a very good reputation.
I stopped going in because they stopped stocking Sonor equipment for some reason and I was big into Sonor a few years back. Since then I just pick up what I need off the Internet. Nice fellers there though, and very knowledgable and informative (assuming same people still in situ).
Good luck with your drumming education. You are doing absolutely the right thing. The only cautionary word I can possibly extend, from a complete amateur, albeit whose pretty much always been involved with bands (apart from a first wife enforced holiday)......learning rudiments is really, like REALLY, boring. And I know, I absolutely know that you'll get all the grognards on here now telling me I'm wrong, and coming up with all manner of perfectly good, sensible, and logical reasons to really get stuck into the rudiments.....
But....it's boring.
Drum lessons...are to a large extent boring to. No. Really. They just are. You have to do what you're told. Go away and read stuff. And practice. zzzzzzz. Drums ain't about doing what you're told and going back to school
Wanna be a geek, get a guitar. Or a bass. Bassists are mega-geeky about their instruments.
What ISN'T boring....is getting your hands on a kit and smacking drums around and creating noise, beats, and ultimately with other people creating MUSIC which is surely the sole purpose of hitting the things in the first place.
So...Don't JUST focus on learning the rudiments. Unless you're some kind of higher sensory human being you'll get bored of it.
These are just my thoughts. It's gotta be fun. Unless it's a job I guess. Which I presume it won't be for you. Fun all the way. And if you're so inclined your primary aim ought to be to get yourself into a band, or onto the jam scene, as soon as conceivably possible. The stuff you will learn, at 53, just be getting out to some pub jam nights and sitting up and playing a cover of I Saw Her Standing There....priceless. And the people you'll meet, generally, also priceless
