As I was growing up, it was made clear that the fat me wasn't welcome, that a thin person was expected and awaited, and impatiently so.

Sticking to a diet required me to have a permanently low self-esteem. But happily, I developed other skills beyond a fluctuating weight, eventually building up a different source of self-worth.

If one's honest about it, spending time in a car with children is pretty ghastly.

When not eating, I like shopping; although I'm afraid I've become a bit of a cliche.

Both Plockton and the Isle of Muck in north-west Scotland are incredibly beautiful. Sadly, Plockton has been discovered by tourists because it's where they shot Hamish Macbeth.

There is an inherent tolerance and kindness in the state school teenagers I know.

I met Tom Baker doing a voice-over when David [Arabella's friend, David Tennant] wasn't at all well known. We were doing this voice-over together and I said to Tom, 'Oh, my friend's a really, really big Doctor Who fan,' and he replied, 'Wait!' He got his cheque book out and asked, 'What his name?' I said 'David Tennant'. He wrote, 'To David Tennant, seventeen pounds forty five', signed it and I asked him what it meant. He said, 'He'll know'