IN Los Angeles, everyone wants to be in the movies. The people you meet on the streets, in the bars, working in hotels; the tour guides at the theme parks, hamming it up in the hope of being spotted; the shop staff, the ice cream sellers, all hopeful stars-in-waiting.

If they’re not actually doing it, they’re talking about it – reading scripts in the coffee houses, practising lines on a run through the canyon, hanging around the premieres and pitching ideas, living it, breathing it.

Just like Mia and Sebastian in La La Land, the movie which swept the board at the Oscars, they are all "fools who dream" – it’s just part of the whole joy and pain of the Hollywood experience.

It’s infectious, too – three weeks in this sunny city and I remember why I love cinema, why I have always loved a really good film, from my childhood watching family favourites such as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to my Brat-Pack-teen-angst phase, to student days at the GFT discovering world cinema, and beyond.

Getting to LA from Glasgow is costly – we saved more than half the price of our air fares and a great deal of the stress by flying from Dublin Airport and staying at the airport’s Premier Inn to break the journey.

LA revolves around film. It’s probably our imagination, we admit, but everything – the street corners, the diners, the cars, the people – looks slightly familiar, as if we have seen it on television, or in a movie. It’s a few days until we stop staring at every passerby in case he or she is famous.

We are staying in ‘old’ Hollywood with an old friend, just around the corner from Hollywood Boulevard and the start of the Walk of Fame. My oldest and closest friend Julie has made her home here – she loves the all-year round sunshine, the buzz, the people.

Hollywood takes me by surprise. I’d thought it would be glitzy, full of glamour and hype, all about the next big thing, the brightest stars. We do see that side – during our stay, a film premiere brings A-listers like Melissa McCarthy and Andy Garcia to Hollywood Boulevard and we see them walk the red carpet to the cheers of gathering crowds.

But this is also a neighbourhood proud of its past and determined to celebrate its rich heritage, with a wide variety of tours and attractions dedicated to conjuring up the Hollywood of yesteryear. There is plenty of vintage glamour – take tea at the Beverly Hills Hotel, travel the Sunset Strip and you might spot some stars, too, along the way.

Three weeks in the sunshine feels like a deliciously long time but there is much to see and do. We walk, mostly, and take the subway which is unexpectedly quiet – LA people drive everywhere – and it can take you as far as Santa Monica. Sometimes we drive, but that’s frankly terrifying, especially on the freeways. (There’s a certain thrill, though, to motoring along Sunset Boulevard, or up Mulholland Drive…)

On one of those drives, we go in search of The Sign. It’s visible from one of the malls on Hollywood Boulevard, just a little speck in the distance, but we want to see it properly. A helicopter tour is out of the question – too expensive and too scary – so we head for the Hollywood Bowl Overlook, a fantastic viewpoint in the Santa Monica Mountains.

The dusty path from the tiny car park – a couple of big American cars or a minibus and there is no room left for anyone else – leads up to the overlook, and the views which stretch over the downtown skyline all the way to the ocean, take our breath away.

It’s our first proper sighting of the sign, and it’s a bit like suddenly spotting the Eiffel Tower in Paris – it makes it real. We are actually here.

Our boys – Archie, 13, and nine-year-old Harry – want to do “as many American things” as possible, and most revolve around food (have a burger, get a milkshake, enjoy a root beer, go out for breakfast). For the latter, we head for Mel’s Drive-In, the epitome of a picture-perfect American diner.

The food is fantastic, the root beer not so much. “It tastes like industrial toothpaste,” says Archie, his face wrinkled in disgust.

Located in the historic Max Factor building, the Hollywood Mel’s shares space with the Hollywood Museum, home of 10,000 exhibits and artefacts from classic Hollywood to present day movie treasures.

It’s right in the heart of things, with the TCL Chinese Theatre, The Dolby Theatre, home of the Oscars, the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel and the Walk of Fame around the corner.

The wonderful Walk of Fame stretches for miles, peppered with little clusters of people crouching for photographs beside the big names, or simply those who mean something to them. We hear that when David Bowie died, people crowded round his star for days, holding candlelight vigils and playing his music, while witty protestors were quick to build a mini-wall around Donald Trump’s.

We learn quickly to avoid the costumed superheroes, who will sneak up and pose with you for a photograph then charge you the earth for it, and take our time taking in the names immortalised on the starry paving stones all the way from La Brea to Gower, from Vine to Sunset.

A trip to Santa Monica is a must – it feels shinier and newer than Hollywood, with its vast beach, packed pier and shopping malls.

There is a substantial British community in LA – the ex-pat group Brits in LA boasts more than 10,000 members – so the British goods store in Santa Monica is always busy with people stocking up on baked beans and DairyMilk.

“We had Cheryl and whatsisname from One Direction in here recently,” the woman behind the counter reveals. “I had no idea who they were, but they were lovely.”

Burgers are bigger and better in California, the boys declare – they adored Johnny Rocket’s, with its marvellous milkshakes and friendly staff.

On the beach at Santa Monica, the lifeguards are friendly but firm, especially as the waves are ferocious. We swim in the Pacific, eat snacks on the sand, take in the vastness of it all.

As a family holiday destination, Los Angeles ticks all the boxes – theme parks, beaches, movies and more.

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios is a revelation. From the twisted chimneys and snowy rooftops of Hogsmeade, to the clever interactive wands and stomach-flipping rides, it is so exciting for a young Harry Potter fan I actually fear his head might explode.

“It’s just like I imagined it,” he gasps. "I feel like I'm in the movies." See what I mean? It's catching....

A two-day ticket to Universal is perfect – at only a few dollars more than the one-day ticket, it allows you to come back within seven days. As we devoted most of day one to Harry Potter, this was ideal. The studio tour is gloriously hammy and fun – we had a close brush with Psycho at the Bates Motel, a thrilling encounter with King Kong on Skull Island, sniggered at the fake shark in the Jaws set-up and enjoyed the guide’s tales of stars and movies in days gone by.

The Warner Bros studio tour is less cheesy and more informative about the studio’s rich past.

We are treated to fascinating insights into how the crazy world of film works – in Anytown Square, one of the generic lots on the site, we hear how one director insisted the trees were stripped of their leaves to film a winter scene, then ‘rebuilt’ using leaves stuck on to branches and attached to the trunk to then film the summer scenes. (It’s true too – the boys looked up and saw the cable ties!)

We got a look behind the scenes on the Big Bang Theory set, sat on the Friends couch at the Central Perk (that one was just for me) and marvelled at the realisation we were walking on the same cobbled streets and paths that Frank Sinatra, Marilyn Monroe and more had travelled decades before.

Getting tickets for the concerts at the Hollywood Bowl is expensive and tricky – you have to be fast off the mark. But the LA Philharmonic rehearse on weekday mornings during the summer and you can sit in for free. I don’t think I’ll ever forget how lovely it was to sit in the sunshine with a picnic, listening to the music drift over the amphitheatre.

People in Los Angeles are friendly, eager to talk, and regularly compliment our Scottish accents. The ticket seller at Legoland – a two-hour drive out of LA to Carlsbad, but well worth the trip – tells us ours is the best accent in the world. A gentleman in the subway, who looks and sounds a little like Morgan Freeman, strikes up a conversation with us about his travels from his home in Connecticut to the Edinburgh Fringe, and one of the many tour guides touting for business along Hollywood Boulevard tells us his cousin used to play for Glasgow Rangers. (We check later on and if his cousin really is Madjid Bougherra, then that is true.)

The Californian lifestyle is easy to love – long, hot days and hardly any rainfall (though Julie admits she misses long, Scottish summer evenings – it gets dark early in LA). Los Angeles is easy to love too, whether you enjoy the frantic world of theme parks and shopping malls; sitting by the pool eating takeout pizza; relaxing on the beach; hiking in the canyons, or all of the above.

This city revolves around film – but there’s much more to La La Land than just movies, movies, movies…

FACTBOX

Ann Fotheringham and family travelled to Los Angeles with British Airways, via Dublin. (www.britishairways.com).

Premier Inn offers stays at its Dublin Airport hotel, from €73.50 per night. Book direct at premierinn.com for exclusive saver rates. Guests can enjoy a Premier Inn breakfast for €11.95 and kids eat free.

Ann Fotheringham and family were guests of Warner Bros Studios (www.wbstudiotour.com) and Legoland California (www.legoland.com).

Tickets for the WB Studio tour cost £50 adults/£40 children online only. Tickets to Legoland California start at £65.

LA Philharmonic weekday morning rehearsals at the Hollywood Bowl (www.hollywoodbowl.co.uk) are free, but check in advance for details. (www.laphil.com).

A two-day ticket to Universal Studios (www.universalstudioshollywood.com) costs from £95.