"Evita" obviously would always be very special to me because it was the first major musical that I did on stage and created in the U.K. with Hal Prince directing.

Learn to take rejection, keep fit and work only with the best in your field.

My first singing role was as Susanna in a school production in a shortened form of Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro. I loved to sing and I was given lots of encouragement by a wonderful music teacher Mrs Ann Hill and by my parents who suggested I go to drama school.

I did miss the music a bit - but only in the wings, when I was waiting to go on. It seemed dreadfully quiet, rather unnerving. But the wonderful thing was that one didn't have to be quite so obsessive about one's health, and one's voice.

Oh, it was awful, and I vowed to myself I would never, ever push myself to the edge that much again. It was really frightening. Because absolutely everything seemed to be impossible to deal with, just little things became major - noise, if someone had a radio on, or even the sound of traffic, or being in someone's company for longer than 10 minutes - I started to find it all too much.

One was never taught how to begin at drama school. But all it required was one intake of breath.

If you're a serious actor, you wouldn't put yourself up for one of those shows in case you got bumped off the first week and all your colleagues saw it.