He was born to Eugenie (Jenny) Gulesserian, daughter of Hrant Gulesserian, an Armenian textile trader from Western Armenia/Eastern Turkey, who set up a branch of the family business when he moved from Istanbul to Manchester in 1904. Nothing is known of David's father other than that he was a married man with whom Jenny had a brief affair. Afraid of bringing disgrace on the family, she never told her father that she was pregnant, and she and her younger sister secretly arranged for David to be adopted.He was adopted by Jim and Joyce Dickinson at the age of three months, and only accidentally discovered that he was adopted when he found his adoption papers at age eleven. He traced his birth mother to Jersey, and conducted a correspondence with her for 20 years before her death, but they never actually met as she did not wish to disturb her new family. It was only after her death that he met his half-brother, who did not know until then that David existed.After leaving school he went into textile trading. He married well-known African-Welsh cabaret singer Lorne Lesley in 1968 and was her manager. They have two children.In 2006 he participated in the BBC's celebrity genealogy programme Who Do You Think You Are? (2004) and traced relatives in the UK and Turkey.