Born in Newport, Gwent Elaine moved to Edinburgh and then to Aberdeen where she had her early education. In Scotland she learned to love the rugged landscape. Still precious to her
are the memories of picking bilberries on the mountains and collecting multicoloured limpet shells in the rock pools at Stonehaven. Moving to Folkestone where she continued her
education, the mountains were replaced by the chalk and the gaultclay cliffs, both rich for fossil hunting, but once again the sea, boats and beaches were on the doorstep.

After receiving her teaching qualification at Worcester she taught in the southeast of England, Birmingham and North Kent before returning to Wales to teach in 1970.