ClassicMom Learns to Tweet at 72 Years of Age

As I have mentioned in other posts, my mother is in her 70’s. You wouldn’t know it, however.  There’s hardly a wrinkle on her face and she still gets carded when she tries to get Senior’s discounts.

Being a young looking, hip senior, my mother always wants to keep up with the latest technology.  A couple years ago she bought an iPad and she learned how to use it successfully to check her email. I recently convinced her that it’s time for a new challenge — it’s time to master the ways of Twitter.

I set up an account for her @IAmClassicMom and wrote her a profile description (based on my observations of some of the common errors she makes when writing me emails). I called her to okay the description for the time being and to tell her she could change it as soon as we set up her iPad to make tweets. She laughed at the description and said, “No. Leave it. I like it.” 

I then walked my mom through how to install the Twitter app on her iPad so that she could start tweeting:

“Okay, mom, tap on the ‘app store’ app.”

“I did it.”

“Good.  Now search for ‘Twitter’.”

“Where?”

“The top right corner of your screen.”

“I don’t see anything.”

“There is a magnifying glass there and a bubble that you can type in.”

“I don’t see anything.”

“What do you see in the top right corner?”

“A circle on a stick.”

“That’s the magnifying glass. Tap on it and type ‘Twitter’.”

“It doesn’t work.”

“What did you just do?”

“I tapped on it.”

“Try again.”

“It brought the keyboard up.”

“Great. Type ‘Twitter’.”

“Hold on. I’m watching Elvis on TV.  Hubba, hubba, hubba, blue Christmas…”

45 minutes later she was ready to send her 1st tweet.

I decided it was best to give my mother as little info about Twitter as possible so that she would learn Twitter organically through trial and error.

Here are her tweets thus far.  Make sure to read from the bottom of the 2nd picture to the top of the 1st picture (NOTE — her tweets automatically feed into my website. Come back often to see what she is up to or follow her @IAmClassicMom):

As you can see, my mother uses bird references in each and every tweet.  I think this is awesome and that she should be part of a marketing campaign for Twitter about proper tweeting etiquette.  Come on people, Twitter is about birds!

Anyway, I’m very excited to have my mom tweeting for my website and I encourage each and every one of you to follow her on Twitter. She is excited about learning Twitter and getting new followers. She hopes that Ellen DeGeneres will follow her soon.  Let’s make it happen, people!

(Feel free to follow me too @ModernHouseDad).