Mrs. Best, Pete's mother met his father, Johnny Best in India during the war. Together, they moved back to Liverpool, and in 1941, their oldest son, Pete was born. Pete went to the Liverpool Collegiate, a grammar school. He was handsome but very shy.
Growing up, Pete and his friends used to hang out at his house, listening to records. He came up with an idea, and asked his mother if they could use the basement for a hangout. Mrs. Best had an even better idea. She decided to make their basement a private club, for the teenagers to hang out.
Now that they came up with this idea, they needed some good bands to play there. That is when they found the Quarrymen. George heard about Pete's mother starting a club. John, Paul, and George all helped Mrs. best and her son clean up and decorate the place.
On opening day, the club still didn't have a name. Since Mrs. Best came from India, she thought of the Casbah Club. It opened in August of 1959. Nearly three hundred people showed up there that night. The club was very successful over the next couple of months. Once, one of their guitarists, Ken Brown, didn't show up to play at the Casbah. He left the band after that.
Pete used to play the snare drum to occupy himself at the club, and when Ken Brown left, Ken wanted to form a band with Pete. They did this, along with two other boys, and they called themselves the Blackjacks.
The Quarrymen had gotten bigger opportunities, they went to Scotland and became the Silver Beatles, but they still played at the Casbah occassionally.
Later that year, Pete decided he wanted to go into show business, so he left school in the summer of 1960. The Casbah was still doing well, but his band wasnt doing that great. Ken Brown had moved away and the other two boys had gotten full-time jobs. Since Pete had left school for show business, he had nothing to do. In August of 1960, he received a phone call from Paul McCartney.
Paul told Pete he could get a set of drums. Pete went to Alan William's club, the Jackaranda, where he met Stuart Sutcliffe for the first time. Pete auditioned, and the Beatles said he could to Hamburg with them.
The Beatles' money went towards their Scottish tour, paid for by Larry Parnes. Bruno Koschmeider, the owner of a Hamburg night club, was looking for a group to take back with him. The Beatles and another band, Derry and the Seniors were picked.
George's mother was worried about her son going to Hamburg, since she had heard stories about it. She let George go, as long as he promised to write her. Jim McCartney on the other hand, was against Paul going to Hamburg. Alan Williams came over to talk to Jim about how nice Hamburg was.
John and his Aunt Mimi fought about him going to Hamburg. She had forbidden Paul and George from coming to her house, and John from playing the guitar in the house. Mimi thought he was concentrating on the Art College, when he was playing with the band. She found out though, and she realized she couldn't stop him from playing, but she was always on his case to do good in school. Then when the issue of Hamburg came up, he lied about how much the band would be paid. At that point, he would've done anything to leave the Art College for good. He had also decided to leave Cynthia, his girlfriend.