Totally normal Tessa! Baby's tend to go through a bit of separation anxiety for mum, some worse than others, but it's just something he has to get past himself. He doesn't realise that if you leave the room that you will in fact come back, he's worried that out of sight means gone forever. It's pretty scary for a little guy when he thinks mummy isn't going to come back for him.

As for touching everything, have you tried telling him no yet? Lots of people will tell you that they don't understand, but they absolutely do. My son was told no from the minute he started crawling at 6.5months & it took him 2-3 days to cotton on what it meant.