Mazzy, hi! I haven't visited this thread for ages, so nice to see it's still around.
Maz, if a simple checkout is taking two hours, something is wrong. Either you've forgotten everything you ever knew, or the instructor wants the hours.
I don't know which it is, but if the second, find another school.
You're not all that far from Sleap, are you? Much cheaper hire than Liverpool, no landing fees for home aircraft, and....YOU ONLY HAVE TO DO A CHECKOUT WITH AN INSTRUCTOR IF YOU HAVEN'T FLOWN FOR TWO MONTHS! Friendly little club too - I miss it.
It might be worth the extra drive for you.
Another option is to take off to France for a few days and do some flying with Sue Burgess-Virr, a British instructor who lives near Limoges and practically specialises in getting Brits their 12 hours - it's how I got mine. See
www.nearlyheaven.com.
If none of that works, bite the bullet and revalidate your PPL by test. A friend just did it and said it was no big deal - no nav, and about an hours general handling...and Bob's your uncle. He said he's always going to do it that way. He did it at Sleap - I have no idea if all flying schools and examiners are the same. But it's certainly cheaper than flying 12 hours for the sake of it.
The other option is to give up flying till you have the money, then renew by test. If you don't leave it too long, it should be no big deal. Again, there's no point in flying simply in order to be allowed to carry on flying! Stopping for a few months or even years really isn't the end of the world.
Hope some of that helps at least a little.
Hang in there.
Whirly