I turned on the hall lights today and one of the bulbs blew (the only
remaining one that worked in fact). There was quite a bang and now I find
that replacing the bulb does no good. Also the front room lights and the
porch lights don't work either. The rest of the downstairs lights work ok.

I've checked the fuses (old wire type jobs) and they are ok. There are two 5
amp fuses with a white dot on them, pulling one turns off the rest of the
downstairs lights and the other turns off all the upstairs lights. I have
also swopped the two around to no avail. The rest of the fuses are 15/30 amp
jobs and all seem to be ok - in that when i pull them something stops
working.

I unscrewed the two hall lights and all the wires seem intact, ditto the
switch.

I now throw myself on the mercy of the group.

TIA.