John Sinister: Is this the archetypal classic car?

Some people love it. Some are scornful: a two-seater Morris Oxford, they sneer. Some admire its crisp lines, unless confronted with a late-model, rubber-bumper version. Some consider it crude, old-fashioned, devoid of innovation. All have a point.

There are still a lot of MGBs in the world, despite the breed's tendency to rust away. Enough of them have been owned by enthusiasts through their lives to have been looked after and to have survived, and it helps that when British Motor Heritage started to manufacture brand new bodyshells for old British Leyland cars, the MGB shell was the first.

I've always had an MGB soft spot, which goes back to the 1/32 scale model kits I made back when the B was new. The Revell one, in grey, was the first, with a reproduction of the 'Superlative MGB' brochure on the box. Airfix's version was a slightly better shape but lacked the chrome parts of its more upmarket Revell rival.

Some years later, when I had been driving real cars for a few years instead of making models, some of my friends were exploring the joys of sports cars after moving on from their mothers' cast-off runabouts. MG Midgets were trending, as we didn't say back then, and although I really wanted a Lotus Elan (far too expensive) I did find myself drawn to the MG world of Safety Fast (the advertising slogan) and the fast-growing MG Owners' Club.

And so, rather than a Midget, I went one better (so I thought) and bought a B. This was 1979, and I found myself a 1972 example whose bargain price was surely related to its need for a new pair of sills. 'You'll find it quite fast if you're not used to thoroughbred sportscars,' the seller assured me on the test drive. It wasn't, obviously – those pesky new Fiat XI/9s could leave it for dead at the lights, I discovered – but I bought it anyway and the seller could now afford to build his new patio.

I welded on new sills, badly, with a cheap arc-welder, setting my MG on fire in the process. Spraying rustproofing wax on the inner sills before welding on the outers was not sensible, but that's how we learn things. Good thing I had a fire extinguisher ready.

Then my then-girlfriend (now Mrs S) and I got into the whole MG vibe – well, I did, anyway – which included taking part in an MG cavalcade along London's Embankment to protest at the closure of the Abingdon factory. That was futile, of course, and I remember the uneasy alliance between misty-eyed MG romantics who had no intention of buying a new one and the union-represented workers whose stake in the factory's future was rather more pressing.

Anyway, after an October camping tour of Ireland in our fine blue sports car, which included a successful marriage proposal fuelled by hot whiskeys to mitigate the colds we were obviously destined to catch, the MG got sold. And I didn't think much more about MGBs for another decade, until I drove a GT version tuned very effectively by Oselli Engineering. 

It had an engine overbored to 1,950cc from the original 1,798cc, a single 45DCOE Weber carburettor instead of the twin SUs, a keener camshaft, a free-flowing exhaust and telescopic dampers in place of the inefficient lever-arm units. And it was marvellous fun, properly rapid and comfortable over bumps, a great illustration of how much an MGB can be improved with a few well-judged modifications.

That said, even a standard one can be better than you might expect if it is truly as the factory intended to be, and not tired as mine was (it's still around, by the way, according to the DVLA website). A friend recently bought a 1972 GT which had somehow managed to cover less than 5,000 miles in its sheltered life, and it was as good a definition of 'timewarp' as you'd find. Driving it was like driving a new car, with that tautness, that smoothness of switchgear, even that smell, all of which are so hard to recreate.

But the best MGB I have ever driven was one built this decade, using a new GT shell, powered by a 2.0-litre Mazda MX-5 engine and costing more than a Porsche Cayman. I drove the MGB GT LE50 by Frontline Developments in 2012, and discovered a car brilliantly conceived with 212bhp (thanks to four Omex 45mm throttle bodies), thoroughly re-engineered suspension with coil springs and Avo dampers all round, electric power steering, alloy wheels like a Jaguar D-type's, air-conditioning and rather less wind noise around the doors than an MGB driver normally suffers.

It was utterly fantastic. The engine revved forever (161mph and 5.1 seconds to 60mph were the stats), there was a squirtable agility in the corners not quite normal in a B, it rode properly and it looked gorgeous. And Frontline can still make you one today, if you can get past the conceptual barrier of paying Porsche money for an MGB. A modern and a classic in one everyday-usable, trackday-flingable package. If I had the spare funds, I'd be over to see Frontline tomorrow.

The MGB, the classic for all reasons. And I haven't even mentioned the V8s. Another time, perhaps.