Although I was never actually based at Sharjah, I used to visit it on at least a weekly basis when I was an Argosy captain on 105 Sqn based in Aden and then 105 Sqn and Ardet in Bahrain. My era was from 1966 until the end of 1971.
I stayed in the mess (and the fort) at Sharjah quite often and it is my memory that Sharjah was indeed an unaccompanied posting but I may be wrong.
Could it be that IAL (International Aeradio Limited) had some family accommodation?
Whilst we are on the subject of Sharjah, has anyone made mention of the RAF Gliding Club at Sharjah? The Club inherited some of the gliders that we had in the Aden Services Gliding Club (which was based at Sheik Othman).
Our two Nissan Patrol 4x4s also ended up at Sharjah complete with several thousand feet of Kenya fencing wire with which we used to auto-tow the gliders behind the Nissans.
In my spare time in the RAF, I was CFI of an RAFGSA gliding club back in UK. The Club at Sharjah went through a period when they didn't have a Full Category instructor so they were unable to send pupils on their first solo etc. I used to help if I could when I was in Bahrain. I would try to do the early morning Bahrain to Sharjah schedule which had about 2 hours on the ground at Sharjah.
I would be met at the nose hatch as I got out of my Argosy by a couple of the lads and spirited across the airfield to the glider launch point (they were pretty much flying off the old sand runway 30/12 which was south and parallel to the "modern" runway (which was only 100 feet wide, by the way).
I would do what had to be done and the lads listened out on the radio until my trusty co-pilot called to tell me that our passengers were boarding, whereupon I would be transported quickly back to the Argosy and depart for Bahrain.
On one classic day, which was a fantastic piece of rostering, I got back to my aeroplane just as Tony M (who was also a Full Cat) taxied in from Masirah, also on his way back to Bahrain whereupon the lads in the Nissan went next door to take him over to the gliding club to take over from where I had left off!