'Young women have hang-ups and hormones.

CONTRARY to popular belief, young men often prefer a sexy, mature women to a younger plain one. A study revealed yesterday that blokes prefer beauty over youth. When shown pictures of attractive older women, and younger ordinary ones, men opted for the former. This isn't wishful thinking - the report was carried in the New Scientist, and carried out by card-carrying "experts". It also comes as no surprise to me. I live with a man - well, a boy really - who is 11 years younger than I am and who has such a whale of a time I wonder whether girls in their early twenties ever get a look in.

But I am under no illusions. You will note the survey said "attractive" and "sexy" older women, not Pat Butcher. I am sure if a man was given the choice between a date with Beyonc, who is 20, and a woman old enough to have given birth to her, he would choose the former every time.

The only way I entrapped a younger man in the first place was by keeping very well preserved.

When we first started dating, my 27-year-old boyfriend said he thought I was in "very good nick". He says girls his own age aren't nearly so honed and harvested. That is because I grew up before the invention of ladette culture - I've never drunk alcohol, smoked or stayed out late in pubs, which is probably why I still didn't have a boyfriend at a very advanced age.

I'VE also avoided childbirth, which I think is very ageing. And whereas I might have been able to relax a bit with a man my own age had I been able to find one who was still available, now that I have a young boyfriend the Pilates classes have increased, the visits to the Aveda colour salon have taken on an alarming frequency, and the amount I spend on anti-ageing creams could have paid off his student loan three times over.

It is also very tiring keeping up with the vagaries of youth culture.

OK, so I know that J Lo is a person, not a toilet cleaner, but I find it impossible to tell Ant from Dec. I have no desire to see Shrek. We couldn't watch any of those "I Love 1973" programmes together until they reach the Nineties. When we go out I like to eat in nice restaurants with tablecloths and a wine list.

And my boyfriend can never pay the bill - in fact the only reason he opened a bank account was for the free CDs. My four-year-old nephew came to stay last weekend, and I realised that he and the boyfriend were wearing identical clothes, only in different sizes.

MY bloke often tells me that one of the reasons he goes out with me is that I am much more interesting than his contemporaries. But it also has to be noted that I already had a nice house, designer furniture, a car, a widescreen TV and a dishwasher. The only thing he brought with him when he moved in was a collection of trainers and a PlayStation 2. I look after him in a way no younger woman can.

Would he have gone out with me if we had met when I was 20? I am sure the answer is no. Young women have spots, hang ups, hormones. They don't have wardrobes of Prada clothes and boxes of Gucci shoes. They can't afford spas.

Older women are more patient, more nurturing (more like their mums, in fact).

And unlike twentysomethings, we realise that a man is not the be- all and end-all of our lives, which makes for a more confident and relaxed approach to sex.

I keep telling him that he is too young to settle down, that he should be out playing football in the road with his mates. I've told him that very soon I'll start watching Last of the Summer Wine and making a Victoria sponge.

He doesn't care. He reassures me that women live longer than men, so hopefully we'll be able to die together. He says he will asked me to marry him on our two-year anniversary, and if I haven't developed varicose veins and liver spots by then, I guess we're going to do it.

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