The high IQ society Mensa is celebrating its diamond anniversary – but how clever do you have to be to join? Sutton Coldfield Observer reporter Michael Beardmore managed to put enough letters in the right order to write his name on a test paper…

I like number puzzles – Sudoku? I can do.

These puzzles? They’re just guesswork.

Fortunately, a large part of the first test, the Cattell B, is word-based.

Those journalistic skills, lyk being abel to spel, that I take for granted everyday, are finally coming in useful.

Does rotten mean: (a) bad (b) good (c) important (d) ambidextrous (e) dodecahedron?

By a process of elimination it must be (a) unless it’s a streetwise question and bad means good.

Which would be bad.

In among the simple duncey questions like the one above lie some real brain-bashers.

Which word means the same as ‘separate': (a) different (b) unconnected (c) unrelated?

The immediate thought that sprang to mind was: are they having a laugh? It’s all of them.

I spent a good five minutes debating the answer – not good when you’ve only got eight minutes to answer about 20.

Every section came with an example and the supervisor asked people to shout out the answer.

No-one did – leaving my poised ‘teacher’s pet’ stare useless.

The second test, the Culture Fair, confirmed all my fears.

Trying to compute whether a dot inside a circle outside a square was different to a dot inside a square outside a circle.

“Odd picture out? They’re all odd,” my brain was shouting, “just pick a letter A, B, C or D and give up.”

When they mark this they’re going to think I’m an utter moron.

Two-and-a-half minutes to look at 15 sets of four pictures and work out which were the best matches.

I looked at the person next to me, puffed out my cheeks and he nodded knowingly.

But this is Mensa after all. It’s not supposed to be join-the-dots easy, it’s nearly mega-cryptic-crossword tough.

Turns out I failed the picture test.

Worst thing about exams is waiting for the results – coming home from work and finding nothing on the doorstep but the word ‘welcome’.

Then the big brown envelope arrives – 131 IQ on the picture round, not good enough for Question of Sport, though; never mind Mensa.

Not as disastrous as I thought though, still inside the top three per cent of the population – ooh, la-di-da.

But I say words speak louder than actions – and I passed on that test with 151, just scraping in (you have to get 148 to be eligible).

Having passed to my surprise (I had been confident going in but came out of the exam room convinced I hadn’t done well enough), there’s one last question to answer.

Will I join? It costs £40-45 per year to be a member – and not even a discount to take into account a lowly journalist’s wage.

I’d like to join simply so I could say I was in (that sounds terrible doesn’t it?) but the price is putting me off.

As for the test, if I can pass, well, anybody can.

Just don’t say I didn’t warn you about those questions…