[1][2] The series followed teen sweethearts Damon Grant (Simon O'Brien) and Debbie McGrath (Gillian Kearney) as they absconded to York to escape their disapproving parents in Liverpool who objected to the relationship because of the class divide.

[3] The Grant family had recently featured in major storylines, particularly the rape of Sheila Grant (played by Sue Johnston), and Damon was used to illustrate the problems of the Thatcher ministry's Youth Training Scheme (YTS), which saw Damon, who expected to be employed by a firm for whom he had worked for low wages, but being told that the company were simply going to replace him with further cheap labour at the end of his service in the scheme.

[4] The producers developed the idea of a 'soap bubble', a term which Redmond credits to Channel 4 executive David Rose,[5] so that the multi-stranded narrative of Brookside would continue during the standard episodes, with two characters co-existing in a separate production.

[10] The three-part series was broadcast late on Wednesday evenings on Channel 4 in November 1987, with an omnibus edition screened over the Christmas period of that year.

The couple visit Morecambe with Goth papadum-packer Jenny (Michelle Holmes), whom Debbie had met at the open day, and her husband, computer programmer Kirk (Ian Ormsby-Knox).

They then move to Bradford, where Damon works as a groundsman at the Valley Parade football ground (reflecting, in an interior monologue, upon the fire there a year earlier).

Crosby actor Jonathan Comer, the extra who played the part of Damon's killer, began to receive threatening phone calls and hate mail shortly after the episode was broadcast.