In its early years UTV cycled through a number of different early evening magazine-style series. First of these was Roundabout, which was a pioneer for the format in the UK. This was replaced later by Newsview, Radius and Parade, before the Roundabout title was revived as Round About 7 in September 1965.

UTV’s listings magazine TV Post ran an article on the new series giving a full rundown of the presenters who would be contributing. These included main linkman Jimmy Greene with Maurice Smyth and Sheelagh McKay in the studio, while Charlie Witherspoon and Leslie Dawes continued with the type of roving reports which they had provided for other similar programmes. Also on the team were Alex Toner for sports reports, John Mercer with gardening tips and two types of reporting which caught the moment.

The first of these was from Maggie Gilchrist and Garth Beattie who would be giving the lowdown for teens on the pop scene in a segment entitled Pop Around. Meanwhile, none other than Patrick Moore would be keeping people up to date with the latest space age and night sky happenings. Already making a name for himself on the BBC’s Sky at Night, Moore had a particular affinity with Northern Ireland at this time as he was the then current director at the Armagh Planetarium.