"Yesterday" was released by The Beatles almost six decades ago, but it was only in the latest episode of the podcast A Life In Lyrics , in which Paul McCartney delves into his compositions, that the singer revealed the meaning behind the line "I said something wrong".
Although it is commonly understood as a reflection on the end of a relationship, the verse actually refers to a time when McCartney mocked his mother, Mary , for looking "too fancy," later regretting having said something wrong.
“Sometimes it’s only in retrospect that you can appreciate it. I remember very clearly one day feeling very embarrassed because I embarrassed my mother. We were in the backyard and she was speaking in a fancy way. She was of Irish descent and was a nurse, so [her manner of speaking] was above street level. So she had that in her favor, and she spoke in a way that we thought was a little fancy,” she recounted.
More specifically, the musician recounted that the problem lay in the way his mother pronounced the word "ask." "I know she said something like, 'Paul, can you ask him if he's going to…' Then I [teasingly] made fun of her. And she got a little embarrassed. I remember thinking later, 'God, I wish I'd never said that.' And that stayed with me. After she died, I thought, 'Oh, shit, I really wish…'"
The impact of small things, according to Sir Paul McCartney.
During the podcast episode, Paul also reflected on the impact that seemingly insignificant things have when we look back at moments from the past.
“I have some of these little things that I know people would forgive me for, because they aren’t big things – they’re small things – but they’re small things that I just think: ‘If I could just grab an eraser, I could just erase that moment, it would be better’,” she said.
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