did you know that the bbc practice of banging coconut shells together to simulate the sound of horse hooves was first translated into a sight gag, not by python, as you would suppose, but by spike milligan, nearly 20 years before holy grail? this is in his "fred" series, where one sketch had peter sellers as the count of monte cristo riding an imaginary horse on screen while knocking coconut shells together. and in one of the goon shows there is an episode where bluebottle, who always reads his own stage directions aloud with his lines, has to go somewhere on horseback and says "gets coconut shells."