There are so many myths about Aberdare. I lived there for two years - yes, I actually chose to come back, so it can't have been that bad! - and I had a great time. You are not required to be back by 11 at all - you can stay out all night just like anywhere else, if you want. There is some fairly tight security around visitors, who need to be booked in if they're going to stay over, but that's because it's a small hall. Also, the fact that it's girls-only means that a lot of the girls have chosen it for reasons of its inbuilt security, so it's only fair. It's very like an old-style residence that you might find at one of the Oxbridge colleges.
The food's terrible, unless it has improved in the last few years since I left, but everything else about it was fine. There was a nice system of common rooms and regular organized events (e.g. there was a winter ball, Christmas parties etc) that didn't seem to happen in other halls. For me, I was quite ill for a couple of years, which was why I had moved back into halls, and it was an easy environment for coping with that - catered, loudspeaker message from the porter when you got phone calls or visitors, little on-site library with computers, etc. Oh, if the same woman is live-in warden as used to be, then she's terrifying and weird. But you don't see much of her. Unless you opt to be a student warden to save money. But don't do that, 'cause then you have to have regular meetings with her, and it's ridiculous...
And as for Virgin Megastore - ha ha. There were more than enough girls who had a different boy staying over each night. (Although if you ever hear the story of how several girls got a Virgin Megastore carrier bag up the flagpole one night, well that was me and some mates. The warden mentioned it at a graduation event. She clearly thought it was someone from another hall, not realising that it was two of her beloved student wardens. We couldn't stop laughing.)