Tracie, I understand your concerns but my teenage observations were made from light-polluted suburban Derbyshire, not a dark site. Today, despite my aging eyes, I still have no difficulty at all observing it from home 10km due south of brilliantly lit Cambridge (the VS is circumpolar …) and in a garden lit by neighbours.
I do not know where Tracey’s members live in North Wales but I remember the skies being markedly darker (and cloudier) there than they were in Derbyshire and my guess is that they are likely darker than where I now live.