Beginner's Luck

I was surprised to see in this week's Times Crossword Club announcement of competition winners...

It was the first time I'd entered! 

The Listener crossword is widely regarded as the most difficult of regularly published crossword puzzles, but Ian R, who does them posted a message on our Discord Crossword Central site saying that 4774 was relatively straightforward.

This was the puzzle:

When I eventually got it, the unclued bottom row answer really was a "Penny Drop Moment"! This is the solution...

It was rather fun. The title, of course, The Usher, is the name of the arcade game with the "Coin P" dropping from it down through the grid. Very clever.

The following week's was quite impenetrable to me, but the next one, No 4776 - Stand your Ground was rather good too. <spoiler alert>The grid contained a two-tiered spice rack with 7 jars of ground (i.e. anagrams of) spice names with the missing letters from the across clues providing the anagrist to make Garam Masala as the eighth</spoiler alert>. I think this might become a regular challenge.