I ALWAYS look forward to World Book Day. This is the day when authors and illustrators like me come out of their holes like moles, blinking in the sunlight and feel suddenly needed, and, dare I say it, important.

We're called upon to talk about the wonder of books, the fun creating them, and some of us even get invited into schools to tell children how we write ours.

I have had some wonderful times on World Book Days working with children in primary schools.

I write and illustrate books for three to 10 year-olds and although the writing itself is very important as a means of communication, the pictures are a source of instant fun because, from a blank piece of white paper, you can conjure up characters before their very eyes like magic.

The quicker you can draw and colour them, the better received the little animal personalities are.

You sometimes get lovely compliments like: "You're a really good artist, aren't you, miss?"

And although the object of the exercise is not to show off, (at least, not too much), the audience uplifts you.

One is just trying to demonstrate how easy it is to quickly invent a character, find a simple way of drawing him or her, and then build a story around them.

When you look at all the colourful children's books in our libraries and book shops, if you realise that so many of them began with a little doodle of a character, a squiggle of an idea, which grew and grew until its creator became so absorbed in it that it ended up as one of the "Mr Men" or a "Simpson", to name just two, you can see what an exciting gift one's imagination actually is.

The best bit about it is that we've all got one. If we just relax and let it doodle its way on to a piece of paper, and then maybe form a story around what appears, who knows where it will end.

Anyone can do it. It doesn't cost much. Only a few moments of your time.

There is nothing like the excitement you feel when an idea arrives in your head and you try to catch it, like a bubble floating in the wind.

You hold it, write it down, and start to expand it. As you do, it starts to take on a life of its own. That's exactly what happened with my own book characters.

The first was a mouse called George. He is an engineer super-mouse. George does what no mouse has ever done before.

In actual fact, he is really my dad but much smaller, with large ears, whiskers and a tail.

When I was little, my father had a shed where he kept all kinds of things in case they "might come in useful".

He saved our old ice lolly sticks (washed), leaky hot water bottles to cut up, washing up liquid bottles with squeezy tops, margarine tubs with lids, nuts, bolts, screw, and all the elastic bands that the postman dropped each morning.

His generation saved and recycled from necessity during the 1940s and he did it ever afterwards. He could make almost anything from his treasure trove of goodies - and so can George Mouse in his tree trunk home.

Aeroplanes for mice - no problem - elastic band-powered, naturally. Narrowboats from large empty matchboxes and woven twigs, musical instruments out of poppy heads and hazelnuts.

An ingenious and imaginative mouse can do anything... and so can we, of any age, who write (and sometimes illustrate) for the fun of communicating their imaginative ideas to others.

So, if World Book Day reminds us all that this is what books are - the chance for us all to set out our stall of ideas for others to look at, then it's an excellent thing.

And in schools, if children can make their own books, as well as telling each other which published books they've really enjoyed, this is the sharing of a treasure beyond price.

I was so much looking forward to yesterday's World Book Day, as was George Mouse, who was preparing his plane for take-off, as you can see if you look for him on www.georgeandmatildamouse.co.uk

Mice love World Book Day!