Ta-ra

A casual farewell heard widely across Northern England, especially strongly in Liverpool and the wider Merseyside area, as well as much of the Midlands. It's often assumed to be a simple doubling-up of "ta" (itself a shortened, informal "thank you," from "thank ye"), turned into a breezy send-off, but no dialectologist has ever pinned down exactly when or how "ta-ra" first came together in that specific form, or why the reduplication took hold in some regions and not others.