I took French from Year 7 to 9, although didn't get a choice in it. (Our year was split into two populations, and mine took French while the other took Spanish).
I took a GCSE in French in Year 9, two years early, although I didn't want to. The whole class was enrolled into it.
I got a grade E.
Afterwards, in year 10 to 11, I didn't have to take French anymore.
Until I moved to a new school, where taking a language GCSE was compulsory, even though I already had one.
So I had to do 2 more years of French.
I had the choice of Spanish or German, but I was terrible at languages anyway, and I was hardly going to do well when I didn't already have the 3 years of foundation knowledge that everyone else had.
So, I finally ended up with a GCSE Grade C in French.
It has now been 4 years since I practiced any French, and can remember basically nothing.