This week I am reaching out to all those people who are cursed by logins, passwords, code numbers, PINs and all the other security paraphernalia that comes with modern life.

I want you to know I feel your pain.

I am even thinking of starting a help group for those of us - and there must be millions - who would find life a lot less stressful if we didn’t have to go through a painful rigmarole, every time we wanted to know, do or buy something.

These days it seems you can’t sneeze until you have logged in and entered a password - if, by some miracle, you can remember what it is.

The other day I was organising a repeat prescription using the fancy and admittedly efficient NHS app.

The only problem is you get nowhere until you can tell it your password, but because I only use it every six months, I have absolutely no idea what it is.

And although you can click on the ‘Forgotten password?’ link, this sets in motion a tortuous and convoluted retrieval system involving the sending of a code number to my phone.

And no matter how many times I press the button, it doesn’t seem to have been sent.

After two minutes of staring at my phone, seeing no code arrive, and trying to think what to do next, suddenly, with a ping, it arrives… then another… and another… until I have nine to choose from - one for every time I pressed the button, thinking nothing was happening.

After wasting another ten minutes of my life trying to overcome the security, I feel like asking for a dose of valium as well, to help me over the trauma.

It wouldn’t be so bad if this was an isolated incident, but I swear that every time I try to do anything, the gods of the internet call a meeting and come up with new ways to frustrate me.

The penalty for forgetting your password is severe: they make you set a new one.

But the easy-to-remember one you want is never good enough.

It doesn’t have enough characters, or needs a capital, or must include a number.

And you mustn’t choose one you use elsewhere, either, and make sure you avoid pet names, your date of birth and your middle name - because they would be too obvious.

So you end up with something that is impossible to keep in your head, and yet the rule is you mustn’t write it down.

Frankly, I’ve had enough of it, but it does make me think back to my childhood, when nothing was more exciting than applying passwords to our gang, setting up and trying to break codes, and passing secret messages to one another.

Who would have thought it would become such a trial?

Meanwhile, the book I am currently reading is about Bletchley Park and the people who broke the German Enigma code.

It’s a story I first became fascinated by, years ago.

But now I know how they felt.