What the word tab meant in the movie "Back to the Future"


If you've ever seen the movie "Back to the Future", you may remember one of my favorite scenes which has to do with confusion about the word tab.

The main character had time-traveled back to the 1950s from the 1980s, and when he orders a Tab (which was the brand name of a popular diet soda introduced in 1963), the man at the counter is confused because to him the word means something else. Here, I'll Google tab and get an exact definition. Hold on. Here ya go:

a creditor's statement : BILL, CHECK

Neither one of those terms is much in use nowadays so my guess is that the gag just kinda falls flat. The man in the 1950s says, "Tab? I can't give you a tab unless you order something!". Back in those days it was common for people to go into a store, get something and ask to put it on their tab, which was a list of things that they had bought. At a certain point, usually after payday, people would come into the store and pay their tab.

Here's the soda, which isn't made anymore, and I was surprised to find that it was still around until 2020:


It was Coca-Cola's diet drink before "Diet Coke", which you can still get. 

I love watching old movies, and old TV shows, and I often know that there's supposed to be a joke, but I don't get it. If I'm lucky, there's someone old enough enough to remember and patient enough to explain it to me, and if there isn't I'll try to Google it, sometimes successfully, but often not.

Give me a Tab! How about a Pepsi Free?

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