"Floh Club" helps seniors with social networking

KUSA - Florence Henderson, the actress best known for her role as Carol Brady on "The Brady Bunch," is trying to help seniors who may be having trouble navigating the computer age.

Henderson has started The FLOH Club, a telephone help center-based service that can help subscribers with e-mail, instant messaging, video conferencing, adding a printer and other common home computing hurdles.

She told the 9NEWS Morning Show that personal experience gave her the idea.

"I created the 'FLOH Club' because I was such an illiterate when it came to technology," she said. "I mean I was terrified of it. I always said, 'I don't want to learn that, forget about it,' and my kids were after me to try and stay connected, get with it, you know. And so, I created the FLOH Club."

The service has operators who will answer questions 18 hours a day, seven days a week. Fees are $25 a month, or a year's membership is $250. Henderson said the operators are specially trained for any situation.

"They're very patient, very caring, and remotely, with your permission, they access your computer, and they will stay on with you as long as you like, you can call as often as you like," she said. "Just to be in the privacy of your own home and not having someone looking over your shoulder thinking, 'This person is really dumb."

"It's like roadside assistance, but for your computer," Henderson said. "And I'm very proud of it. In the last few months since I started FLOH Club, I could do none of this before. Now I can share e-mails, I can share photos, I can video conference, I can do Facebook, I can do all of these things, in just a few short months. So it really is fabulous."

For more information you can access the FLOH Club Web site here.