Thought ‘Yesterday’ was a song entirely about love, but singer-songwriter Paul McCartney recently revealed that the line ‘I said something wrong’ was an apology he sent to his mother.

During the podcast A Life in Lyrics which discussed the lyrics and creation of famous hits, McCartney recently said the classic line “I said something wrong” from the song Yesterday might have been inspired by woke up when he remembered how he “mocked” his mother when she spoke in a bit of a manner.

He added: “Sometimes people have to reflect before they can evaluate the impact of their sins. To this day, I am still ashamed of the day I humiliated my mother.”

McCartney added: “It was one time many years ago, when we went out to the backyard and had a short talk. My mother is Irish and is a nurse, she is educated, not the type. talk in a common way. At that time I was too young, and I found it a bit flashy.”

He recalls: “She was originally from Wales, and my aunt Dilys was also from here. So when she said to me: ‘Paul, go in and ask…’ I imitated it and then said: ‘Hoai ! Hoai! That’s asking mom.”

Paul McCartney with his mother Mary and younger brother Mike

Paul McCartney

In that moment, she was a little embarrassed. He confessed: “I remember just a moment later realizing how wrong I was. I said in my heart: ‘Oh God, I wish I hadn’t said that’.”

And it seems, it stuck until today, even after she passed away from cancer. McCartney wrote Yesterday when he was 24 years old, by which time she had been gone for nearly a decade.

Recalling painful memories, McCartney said: “There are so many things that happen in our youth and adult years that we can’t fully appreciate them. I did a few little things wrong that I know everyone will Forgive me, because they are not so big. But when my mother died, I was in unbearable pain.”

So when he included this line in a song about lost love, he didn’t know if it made sense. He expressed: “But I think yes, because both are losses that are not easily forgotten.”

In 1965, on the album Help!, the above hit was noted to have been composed by two members, John Lennon and Paul McCartney. But according to McCartney, he was the one who performed most of the songs. Therefore, in 2000, he once asked Yoko Ono to change the credits of Yesterday from Lennon-McCartney to McCartney-Lennon, but she refused.

The vinyl includes the song Yesterday

The Beatles Vietnam

To this day, Yesterday remains one of the super hits of the Beatles. It was voted the best pop song of all time by prestigious music magazine Rolling Stone and MTV in 2000. It also holds the record for being one of the most covered songs in music history ever recorded, with over 2,200 versions. In 1997, it was enshrined in the Grammy Hall of Fame.