I grew up in that era. I’ll add that, the area code of your telephone number was dictated by where you lived. You could only make “free” calls (included in your monthly bill) to the same area code. Different area codes were considered long distance and incurred a per-minute additional charge. I had friends and relatives that lived an hour away, but calling them was considered “long distance”. Given the price of gas at the time, it could be cheaper to drive to them to have a long conversation.

Another “world” we no longer have is the age of “collect call” and “calling cards”. Collect calls meant you were calling someone, but they accept paying the charges. This was often used if you had to call someone from a payphone and didn’t have money. Or, you had to call your parents long distance from your friend’s phone and didn’t want to charge it to them.

Then there’s the “calling card”. These allowed you to pre-pay for calls. You used to be able to buy a card at gas stations, drug stores, etc. that had prepaid domestic and long distance minutes on it. You’d call the number on the card first, enter the card info, then enter the telephone number you were calling. When you ran out of minutes, it would just hang up. Sometimes a voice would come onto the line and warn you that your time was almost up.

House phones were a great source of entertainment in the 80s. If you dialed zero, you were connected with a live operator you could prank. There was no caller id, so just dialing random numbers to prank was fun. Always in the same area code though. Otherwise your parents would get a charge on the bill at the end of the month and you’d be toast.