I once had reason to walk down the high street in Llanelli one afternoon, alongside Phil Bennett. It felt like the scene from a sentimental Hollywood film. Women shouted their hellos from every shop front, men yelled down from scaffolding and every other car beeped cheerily and drivers waved at the town’s most famous and best-loved resident. But the really striking thing was that as the Scarlets’ greatest ever rugby player responded, he seemed to know the name of every well-wisher.