[8][9][1] His father Francis Byrne was a history teacher,[10] communist,[11] and Labour councillor;[12] his mother Lydia Brusseel was Belgian, a Flemish-speaker from Ghent, who had met her future husband when he was stationed in the city at the end of the Second World War.

[13] Key grew up on the Marks Gate council estate in Dagenham[14] "in a home where Catholic faith and Socialist politics were the twin pillars of a moral life".

In March 2020 a retrospective exhibition of his graphic work and writing, curated by Pansy Cradledew and crowd-funded by friends and fans, was held at the Menier Gallery in Southwark.

[28] Key began writing and drawing as a teenager, and his first attempt at publishing was to advertise photocopied stories for mail order in Vole, with very limited success.

[30] As well as stories, Key also wrote poems, drew cartoons, published film and TV reviews in student magazines, and created collaged postcards, which he sold on a weekly stall in Norwich.

[28][31] By 1986 Key was living and working in London and, inspired by the postpunk DIY ethic, he joined with his university friend Max Décharné to found the Malice Aforethought Press.

[32][33] Malice Aforethought's pamphlets brought them contacts in the world of small press publishing, which led to the commissioning of pieces by Key for the ReR Quarterly, a combined LP and magazine.

[36] A number Key's works from this period were later republished in print: Unspeakable Desolation Pouring Down From The Stars,[37] Obsequies For Lars Talc, Struck By Lightning[38] from 1994, and three early Massacre: Anthology pieces in We Were Puny, They Were Vapid.

[43][21] In its new incarnation "Hooting Yard" was no longer just the name of the site but an imagined territory with characters and locations shared between the individual pieces, even if there was little concern for consistency.

"[46] The Dabbler refers to "the fully-formed parallel universe of Hooting Yard, with its forts and wharves, its strange cities and haunted zoos, its inexplicable violence and its cast of outrageous characters including intrepid explorer Tiny Enid, prolific pamphleteer Dobson, the hapless Blodgett and the terrifying Grunty Man.

Entitled Hooting Yard on the Air, it was broadcast live from Resonance FM's South London studios and consisted almost entirely of Key narrating his own short stories and observations.

In addition his short stories Bubbles Surge from Froth,[56] Boiled Black Broth and Cornets,[57] and Far Far Away[58] were performed by Norm Sherman on the short-fiction series Drabblecast.