He was the pencil-nosed puppet who ruled kids prime-time telly

A puppet with a pencil for a nose, who lives on the moon and comes down every afternoon in a creaky, patched-up rocket to draw pictures?

A family of blue heelers living an ordinary suburban existence in Brisbane? A pair of walking, talking bananas, wearing, yes, pyjamas? A dad and his three kids living in a lighthouse and having supernatural adventures most weeks of the year? A young boy and his trusty pet kangaroo?

The list goes on. And they all, in their own ways, hit the spot of comfort and safety. That warm embrace we all felt, at some stage in our early lives, of afternoon telly - after school, before the news, snack in hand and little else to distract us.

It's no surprise that a major new exhibition at the National Museum of Australia focused on Mr Squiggle, the aforementioned pencil-nosed puppet, is set to be a crowd-pleaser. Think of all of the adults mired in the highs and lows of parenting. Why, we wonder, can't our kids just be happy with something as simple, innocent and ingenious as Mr Squiggle?

Created in the earliest days of Australian television by a young cartoonist named Norman Hetherington, Mr Squiggle had a basic premise that would remain the same for the next 40 years.

Children would write in with a "squiggle", and Mr Squiggle - a marionette operated from above by Hetherington himself - would turn them into recognisable drawings with his pencil nose.

Quite often, the picture would be upside down, and Mr Squiggle would ask his human companion to flip it the right way, revealing the picture.

Viewers can date themselves by the companion they most remember - Miss Gina, then Miss Pat, then Miss Sue, then Miss Jane (my era for sure) then, after they dropped the "miss", Roxanne and finally, Rebecca Hetherington, Norman's daughter.

It's Rebecca who's behind the show; she had the solemn task, after Hetherington died aged 89 in 2010, of deciding what to do with his vast collection of work.

In his home studio, which remained intact, he had kept every drawing, sketch, script, letter and puppet he'd ever been involved in, as well as stage designs, set decorations and costumes.

"Years ago, when dad was still alive, I didn't really think that anyone would be necessarily interested in them," she says.

"So I actually thought, oh, it's going to be me and a storage unit for the rest of forever."

But with both her parents gone, and with no rush to pack up the family home, she had the luxury of time to consider the collection, and ensure it remained intact.

"I could unpack it in my head, and I started talking to different institutions, just to find out what the process was," she says.

"But obviously no one, except for the museum, could really look at the whole collection.

"He really kept all his creative output. It really told such a great story that it was a shame to break it up."

Last year, the museum took into its collection more than 800 objects from the Hetherington archive, one of its most significant acquisitions.

The exhibition takes in Hetherington's life and career, which intersected with several historical touchpoints in Australia, and includes about 300 items on display. But there's no question that the main event is the quaint little fellow in stripey tights and a calico smock.

Displayed in a glass case alongside his co-stars the grumpy Blackboard and his trusty little rocket, Mr Squiggle (there was only ever one version of the puppet) will be getting a hero's welcome every day of the week, as people make a beeline for him.

Sophie Jensen, the National Museum of Australia's deputy director and chief curator, well remembers the first time she encountered Mr Squiggle in the flesh, so to speak. It was several years ago, as part of the years-long conversation between Rebecca Hetherington and the museum, that Jensen finally visited the studio.

It was an eerie wonderland, filled with drawings and tools and fabric. Puppets hung from the ceiling, many covered in cloth to protect them.

"Rebecca inevitably said, 'Do you want to see Mr. Squiggle? And in my heart, I was thinking, I'm really just more excited to see Blackboard, because I love Blackboard," she says.

It's worth noting that Jensen is one of the most senior figures in her trade - a museum curator with decades of experience. She's also a grown adult with the fondest possible memories of Miss Jane and Bill Steamshovel, and the rest of the gang. This was the ultimate celebrity experience.

"Rebecca hung him on the stand, and she pulled up his calico. And, you think, 'Oh, my goodness, that's Mr. Squiggle, that's amazing'.

"But it wasn't. It was just this puppet," she says.

"And then Rebecca just tweaked one little thread, and he moved his head. And literally, my heart stopped ... it was him, come to life."

The show is about the life and work of Norman Hetherington, but it's also a masterclass in history, good fortune, Australia's creative landscape, and the joys of just giving it a go.

Born and bred in Sydney, Hetherington enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in 1942 and was quickly identified as someone with a gift for entertaining.

He was then transferred to the 2nd Division Concert Party - which was later known as no. 4 Detachment, 1st Australian Army Entertainment Unit - when his lightning sketch and performing abilities were recognised.

He served with the First Australian Army Entertainment Unit throughout the war, performing shows, capturing scenes in watercolours, and making quick sketches of his fellow officers, to great effect.

"It's a really important part of military life, the morale of the troops," Jensen says.

"They [the entertainment unit] were there to ensure that people were entertained, that there was a warmth and humanity, in fact, to their military experience."

Rebecca says her father was diffident about his experience - he had a "good war", through sheer good fortune, but still saw things he wouldn't talk about until many years later.

He also lived through the Depression, which taught him resilience, and gave him a creative outlook when it came to making do. After the war, he discovered the art of puppetry and became involved in the dawn of television.

"His lifespan constantly intersected with some very interesting times," Rebecca says.

"I also say about him that it's all very well having good fortune, but if you don't meet it with hard work and perseverance, it's wasted."

She remembers her father constantly working. Mr Squiggle was a family affair; he created the puppets and performed all the voices, his wife Margaret wrote the scripts, and Rebecca was his final onscreen companion. But he always had multiple projects on the go - books, new characters and public campaigns.

"He never stopped thinking about what he could do to entertain people. He was wildly imaginative but always with a great sense of purpose and direction," she says.

Jensen, who has led a large team of conservators in bringing together the visual narrative of an extraordinary life, says Norman Hetherington was "utterly, relentlessly creative".

"I still get amazed when I think that he sold his first cartoon to the Bulletin at 16," she says.

"He was, even at that stage, really quite a creative talent in terms of his ability to be able to think, 'I want to be a cartoonist. That's my dream', and he was actively working in that space.

"So the collection has to trace his whole creative arc, and it creates, at that same time, an arc of the Australian creative industries."

It is, she says, an exhibition for the many adults who grew up in simpler times, when a puppet with a pencil for a nose was considered entertainment royalty. And it's a chance for the children of today to rediscover him, and try their hand at the art of the squiggle.

Rebecca says her father would be amazed, and bewildered, by the exhibition - its scope, and innovation, and especially the interactive drawing wall where visitors can make their own squiggle, projected onto a massive screen.

"He would just be shaking his head and looking around and loving it," she says.

"That is one thing I'm sorry that he hasn't had the enjoyment of, meeting and working with people like Sophie and the conservators ... he would be really interested in their expertise."

Most of all, she says, he'd want people to understand that his whole life and career had been about giving things a go and having fun.

"When you say it's about Norman Hetherington, yes, it is. But I really hope that people walk out with a sense of, you can really do anything you want.

"Why not be a cartoonist? Why not pick up and start drawing? Why not take up that watercolour class I was thinking about doing?

"What's holding me back?"