CB kicked off big style in the UK from around 1977 or 1978 due to a couple of films, Smokie and the Bandit being one of them, where CB radio use was prominent in the films. At that time it was illegal and though some rigs were available with FM it was mainly AM and SSB which had been smuggled into the country. It was great fun, however there became a pressure group pushing for it to be made legal, plus the younger kids were getting rigs given to them, so by the time the legislation was changed and CB became legal in 1981, there were just too many idiots who were just messing about to annoy everyone else. That is when I decided to take the Radio Amateurs Exam and get a ham license. Passing the exam entitled you to a "B" grade license where you were only allowed to transmit on VHF frequencies and a maximum power of I think 50 or perhaps might have been 100 watts. Two years of damned hard work learning morse code and manged to pass a test at twelve words per minute to then gain the full "A" class license giving me all of the allocated amateur radio bands.
I still maintain the license and still have the two transceivers, though haven't used them for years now.
For the record, the call sign is G4TMY.