One Direction Concert in Houston, TX

Tonight, on the eve of my 40th birthday, I spent time screaming, singing and dancing with a few fun friends, my sister-in-law, The Happy Housewife, and some very young boys…

And those very young boys, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Liam Payne, Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson of One Direction, sure knew how to get a crowd of girls going.

This was my view of the stage from our seats, thanks to my generous husband who totally hooked us up with some sweet tickets…

And this is just a glimpse at those who sat stood and danced behind us…

The One Direction guys said that, at 20,000 in attendance, this was their biggest live audience to date.

And as the very first British group in U.S. chart history to debut at number one with their first album, I have no doubt they will be met with many more packed concert venues on the rest of their tour.

You could definitely feel their enthusiasm in being there, performing for so many screaming girls… and a few moms and a few dads and a couple boys scattered in there, too, and then us, happily married women there without our children, just having a blast and pretending to be 16 again, giggling ourselves at the hysteria of the girls around us… and loving it all just the same, even if my ears are still ringing from all those squeals.

Of course, as probably the only ‘older’ women in the crowd, we saw lots of girls with and without their parents and I couldn’t help but let my mind wander back to my first concert with my parents (8th grade, Tears for Fears– My mom won tickets on the radio!!) and my first without my parents (Junior year of high school, George Michael– Went with a huge group of friends from school after waiting in line to buy tickets when they went on sale).

All of this makes me curious: How old were you when you went to your first concert, with and without your parents. And what concerts were they?

Let me know in the comments so we can reminisce together… and pretend to be crazy young again.