Stuart Macbeth, the frontman of the country's premier jump-blues and vintage jazz group, Oxford's Original Rabbit Foot Spasm Band, on why his thirst for a small coffee makes him feel like a crack addict...

It’s midnight on the forecourt of Twickenham station. The exhausted shopkeeper is trying to close up. Suddenly my shady figure emerges from platform Z. I push to the front of the counter, palms outstretched, and beg for a late night cup of coffee. I would drop to my knees and drool if I thought it would work. I don’t care if it’s instant I’d tell him – I just really need a fix from your overpriced coffee.

In America they take cases like me seriously. I’ve read on websites that “the addict feels tired in the morning so reaches for a cup of coffee to feel awake enough to get through the day”. This certainly sounds right. Assuming I can go “cold turkey” I should find “withdrawal” kicking in after 18 hours.

At this point will they lock me in a padded cell? Will I make those filter coffee noises from the TV advert with my hands chained together, while I hallucinate jars of Nescafe emptying their dirty protest on the walls? I needn’t worry – there’s no way I’m going to go 18 hours without a cup of coffee. But should I get the guts up to try there’s a “helpline” I can call. And if all else fails there’s a course of “Caffeine Recovery and Rehabilitation”.

I only wanted a small Americano. Suddenly I feel like a crack addict.

Now I apologise to anyone who really does have a coffee “problem“. I’m sure some people do have serious problems related to caffeine. But the biggest problem I can see facing today’s coffee drinker is what on earth you’re supposed to order. Because just asking for “coffee” doesn’t cut it any more.

I’ve stood in these High Street queues. I’ve observed people as they run eyes over the extensive menu board. I’ve heard us all order with confidence, safe in the knowledge that no-one in their right mind has the faintest idea what difference is between a cappuccino, a frappuccino, a latte, a mocha, a flat white and so on, and on. It’s like sticking your hand in the lucky dip.

All these 21st century coffee options make me nostalgic for the days when the vending machine at Gloucester Green bus station would spit out a basic cup for 40p. If you told the woman behind the counter that you worked on the buses you’d get a free biscuit too. Simple, halcyon days.

Looking back even further you may be surprised to learn that the first cup of coffee ever consumed in England was brewed in Oxford by a Balliol student named Nicholas Canopius back in 1637. And that the oldest coffee house in England opened on our High Street in 1650, a full two years before coffee shops hit London. But none of this Mastermind-winning gift bag of knowledge saves me tonight.

So I‘m going to call the American helpline after all and cry my eyes out. Where did this addiction come from? Where will it end? And where I can get a mango-infused, half-baked, flat cappuccino at 1am in Twickenham on a Thursday night?