It was only their second-ever single.
Yet the seeds of Beatlemania were already sprouting rapidly when the group's second single, Please Please Me, was released in 1963.
The mop tops' skyrocketing popularity lead one enterprising young fan to ask for The Beatles' autographs after seeing her idols perform at the legendary Cavern Club in Liverpool as a youngster.
Now, nearly half-a-century later, that same record has sold for £9,000 ($14,744) at a sale held in the Paul McCartney Auditorium at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts.
Of course, there's no such thing as 'your average' signed Beatles seven inch - yet this example is rarer still, having been double-signed by all four Beatles.
How many signatures would you like on your Beatles record? |
John, Paul, George and Ringo were obviously in a good mood on the day their young fan approached them. Each signed the record twice, once of the record's obverse and once on its reverse.
But it has a way to go before its value is in the same league as the world's most valuable record: Double Fantasy album signed in 1980 by John Lennon for his killer Mark Chapman.
The signed Double Fantasy is last known to have been sold in 1999 for around $150,000, highlighting the morbidity which sometimes drives the collectibles markets.
Meanwhile, the £9,000 sale of Please Please Me in Liverpool demonstrated that rare pieces from The Beatles' heyday, when Beatlemania was at its hottest, are also among the most valued collectible Beatles pieces on the markets.
Other highlights in the auction included a cap owned by John Lennon which sold for £3,200.
And the door of number 38, Kensington - the location of Percy Phillips studio where the Quarry Men, who later became the Beatles, made their first recording on July 14, 1958 - brought £2,300.
Watch this space for more Beatles memorabilia news.
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