Behind the Laughter

SHERRIE HEWSON

Sherrie

Behind the Laughter

Dedication

To Mum, Keeley, Ollie and Molly

Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Photographic Insert 1

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Photographic Insert 2

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Acknowledgements

Picture Credits

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

Introduction

Nothing is ever straightforward in my life, and writing this book was no exception. In fact, at one point I truly believed there was a force out there similar to Darth Vader that really had it in for me. Each time I opened my laptop, his big glowing tube (OK, light sabre) would gather momentum and strike, causing disasters to happen – I was beginning to think it had all been sent to give me a reason not to do the book.

When you speak to real writers they find every excuse in the world not to write, from mundane tasks such as plants that need watering to ‘I have to watch This Morning – they’re doing a bikini wax on men’ or ‘I must clean my drains’ and even, ‘There’s a wild Alaskan bear in the garden!’ Yet once you’ve had a wee, brushed your teeth, found something nice to put on (and maybe a bit of mascara just in case), made a cup of tea, found your glasses, tied your legs to the table and started work, it’s so satisfying and therapeutic, if humbling and harrowing at times.

When what you’re writing happens to be your own story, the whole memory thing can be a bit of a worry. Sometimes you find yourself doubting you were in certain places at certain times and you do have to keep on confirming everything and consulting the reference library – in this case, my lovely mum. The mind is a trickster: it can play games with you. So, did I see The Beatles live in the Gaumont Cinema, Nottingham, in 1962 or was I backstage sitting on Paul McCartney’s knee? Did Julie Andrews inspire me to become an actress when I saw her in The Sound of Music at the ABC in Derby or was I actually in the film itself? In both cases, I’m sure you can guess the truth. So, you do have to be vigilant and honest, even if the real story isn’t quite as exciting as you would have wished.

The only thing is, when you’ve sat for a long time writing, your bum goes numb, you have to get up and the whole excuse thing starts all over again. I did have a genuine reason not to work on Christmas Eve: I’d had a very bad fall and cracked my ribs and injured my back in the process on a great big lump of ice. Naturally, sitting was extremely painful yet I gave myself every reason to work through the pain. How contrary is that?

It was a good job it happened at Christmas, too, because just before that, five of us – Zoe, Carol, Denise, Andrea and I – were thrilled to be asked to take part in the BBC’s Children in Need. I think we have Zoe to blame for the next bit: we were told they would like us to be Girls Aloud and sing ‘The Promise’ … wait for it, LIVE! Zoe is the only singer, Carol and I scatter cats for miles, Denise is passable and Andrea is, well, very tall.

We rehearsed with the Children in Need team and you could see it on their faces: the look of pain and knowing it was too late to turn back. Meanwhile, we started to love the song and the idea of being pop stars, but the more we got carried away the worse we became. Poor Zoe knew she couldn’t do any more with us! Later, we were fitted for our gold sparkly dresses (which were incredible) and then came the night itself. We were in a dressing room next to Take That, no less. In 2009 Robbie Williams had been a guest on Loose Women and we all fell in love with him. Carol and I went out with his lovely wife Ayda and his mum Jan, who I knew anyway, and got absolutely hammered. The next day Robbie let Carol know that he was very cross with us – he’d never seen his mum so drunk before.

While we waited to go onstage, I went out for a walk to calm myself down and Robbie passed me. ‘Hey,’ he shouted. ‘You OK?’ ‘No, Robbie – we’ve got to be Girls Aloud in a minute, we’re terrified!’ I told him. ‘Don’t be silly,’ he laughed. ‘We all think of you as Nanas Aloud, we love you all!’

I told the other girls this and it did calm us down – we didn’t have to be the proper Girls Aloud, just us. Of course, Take That went on and stormed the place and we were next up. There we were, the five of us, lined up in our full-length glittering gold dresses, big hair and sexy make-up, microphones at the ready … and knees knocking together in terror. At that moment all we could think was, ‘Why on earth did we agree to this?’

We were about to perform before an audience of 12 million people and it was one of the scariest things we’d ever done. As we walked on to a roar from the crowd, the music started up and the atmosphere was amazing. Every time one of us sang solo, the audience went mad – which was just as well because, hopefully, they couldn’t hear us then. It was electrifying and for those few short moments we really did feel like Girls Aloud (or as Robbie affectionately calls us, ‘Nanas Aloud’). Maybe we could start our own band for Nanas everywhere.

That was one of my highlights for Loose Women in 2010 and we know 2011 will bring us many more. The team backstage is wonderful – they work so hard and have to put up with us, too, but whenever we have our end-of-term parties or ‘after school’ drinks we are very close, a proper team. I’d like to say thank you to them all.

I have written a book before, a short novel called The Tannery. It was an extremely dark tale, very disturbing but fictional. This is so much harder because it’s the truth: you don’t want to come over as all sad or bitter, even pathetic, so you must guard against that. Luckily, seeing things in black and white can be highly therapeutic. They say there’s a book in all of us and I truly believe that. You know when your mum or granny says, ‘I could write a book’? Well, I honestly believe they can and should – my mum certainly could.

As you will see, I write as I act: from the heart. I don’t have any special technique … and I can hear you all agreeing with this. With me, what you see is what you get and I hope it gives you an understanding of who I am, my wacky behaviour, all the hurts and the triumphs along the way. You may recognise some of the things I’ve been through as being part of your own world because at the end of the day we’re all the same – just wrapped up differently. That’s why Loose Women is such a great show because there’s always someone you can relate to.

So, thank you for opening my book. You may well be shocked at some of the things that have happened in my life, but I hope you will laugh reading it just as much as I did writing it.

Chapter One

I was the spitting image of Winston Churchill when I was born; all I needed was a cigar and the appropriate ‘V’ sign. So pretty, I was probably not. I also had webbed feet à la Donald Duck. I’m not painting an attractive picture here, am I? In fact, I was the chubbiest, grumpiest baby in the world.

My birth, in what was perhaps a sign of things to come, was far from straightforward. Within hours I had to have a complete blood transfusion: the doctors feared I might be afflicted with the same condition which my brother Brett had suffered from when he popped out, 18 months earlier. He’d caused havoc by nearly dying: Mum lacked vitamin K, meaning Brett’s blood wouldn’t clot and instead poured out of every orifice in his tiny body. She was also desperately ill and too weak to choose a name for my brother – who, the doctors agreed, wouldn’t make it through the night. Remarkably, both survived; maybe that’s what made them into the strong, resilient people they are today.

I arrived in 1950, five years after the war had ended, but I never felt a thing. Indeed, my life was cushioned from day one. Shortly after I was born, the family moved from my grandparents’ house in the village of Beeston in Nottinghamshire to their very first home – a semi-detached down the road. It had a lovely garden and my mother would place Brett and me in our prams there to get some fresh air. Brett was good as gold, but I wriggled, squirmed and tried to escape until I ended up on at least one occasion hanging out of the pram by my neck.

My mother, Joy, was an extraordinary woman. Her own mother, like most women at that time, had been a housewife and had never gone out to work, but Mum had other ideas. Beautiful, determined and clever, she had energy and vision. And she knew what she wanted: to own a lovely home, send her children to private school and watch us make our mark in the world.

My parents met immediately after the war when Mum was a young woman and Dad was ten years older. Her day job was working for a friend in the clothing industry, but her real passion was ballroom dancing and modelling. She worked for various fashion labels, including Slix swimsuits and Chanel, and she won all kinds of prizes, both locally and nationally, for her dancing. My mother was, and still is, ultra-glamorous, stylish and elegant. Her wardrobe was bursting with beautiful dresses and the most glorious ballroom gowns. She seemed so magical, I used to love to dress up and try my hardest to look like her.

My father, Ron Hutchinson, was born near Sunderland in the North East. His mother died just after his birth and his father skedaddled from the family home, leaving Dad to be brought up by his aunties and uncles. I never knew much about his life up in the North, although I do remember visiting a terraced house where the door led straight into the kitchen and there was a rather large, jolly lady, who cuddled me all the time. It makes sense that she would be related to Dad as he was the most tactile man you could ever wish to meet.

I remember as you looked out of the back-room window of the house there was a large field and a pit, and so I always thought Dad’s family must be miners. They were Macams, which means ‘Sunderland-born’, never to be confused with Geordies from Newcastle. They did, however, have one thing in common: at New Year they had what was called the ‘First Footing’. It was one of my most joyous memories: I would sit on Dad’s knee and wait as midnight neared. Everything would go deadly quiet and as the clock struck twelve, in came a tall, dark and handsome man – probably a family friend, but to me a glamorous stranger – holding a piece of coal, a coin, salt, bread and whisky. Everyone would cheer and the party would begin. It may have been a superstition, but to me this was truly exciting; to Dad and his family it meant health, happiness and prosperity for the coming year.

Although he was happy at home and loved his family, Dad left at a very early age to discover the world. He had a natural wanderlust and curiosity about life till the day he died. At the age of 15 he joined the Army; that was before the war, which he managed to survive, unscathed. He led a charmed life: he attracted people, especially women, and a certain general’s wife took a fancy to him and insisted he become their personal chauffeur. As a result, the closest Dad came to battle was when the General and his wife had a row.

After the war, Dad drove for a General Palmer and had access to all the Army and Air Force bases, including the ones where the Americans were stationed, which meant he could get his hands on the so-called ‘black market’ goodies. He would turn up at my grandma’s house when Mum was at work with nylon stockings, chocolate, bananas and all manner of treats. Dad was so charming and handsome, he looked just like the heart-throb Errol Flynn and no one could resist him.

My mother would come home to find him having tea with my grandmother. Mum wasn’t short of suitors and was in no rush to settle down, but Dad was determined to win her over. He even took up ballroom dancing to impress her and became extremely accomplished. Later, he taught me the chacha, which we danced together on many an occasion. Eventually, his persuasive charm won Mum’s heart and the two of them married and set up home together.

Dad left the Army and began work for a company called Constance Murray, which made very upmarket men’s and women’s clothing. As the saying goes, he could sell snow to the Eskimos and so he was in his element in the retail trade. But it was when he sang that he came into his own: he was a Bing Crosby-style crooner and performed with all the big bands across the country.

I adored my dad. He was a warm and loving man and his love for me was unconditional. If I’d murdered ten people that morning he’d have said, ‘Never mind, darling – eat your breakfast and we’ll find a way.’ But he was also a restless dreamer, more often away than he was home, who never really allowed himself to be tied down to family life. We all used to joke that he should never have married and had children. It was only years later when I had my daughter Keeley and he came to live with us that he truly became part of family life and to every-one’s surprise proved to be a dab hand at childcare, cooking and housework.

In those early days it was Mum who organised everything and everyone, made the decisions and ran the show. She was the kind of woman who could do six things at once, and frequently did. Although she adored Brett and me, she wasn’t a stay-at-home mum but a force of nature, always full of ideas, plans and boundless energy.

I only remember one time when she was ill. She’d been up a ladder – she was always wallpapering or decorating – when she fell off. Her womb collapsed, so she had to have an emergency hysterectomy and then, as was the custom in those days, she stayed in a convalescent home for several weeks. I was still only three and not allowed inside, so my grandparents would take me there and I’d stand in the grounds waving up at Mum as she stood at the window.

My brother Brett was a lovely-looking child, blond and blue-eyed and angelic, while I was chubby and, as I have said, a potential body-double for Winston Churchill. As I grew older I became aware of how Brett’s good looks got him attention, or so it seemed to me, and maybe that explains why I became a potential serial killer. At two and a half years old, for some extraordinary reason I climbed out of my cot one night, negotiated the mountainous staircase, navigated my way around the house and picked up a knitting needle from my mother’s chair. At that point I discovered Brett sitting on the floor, watching the telly, and proceeded to shove the needle down his throat.

Of course it may have been that I was just plain curious as to how far I could submerge it: who knows what went on in my infant mind? Strangely, Brett – who was a strapping lad of four and much bigger than me – opened his mouth and allowed me to shove the needle in, at which point he started to choke.

The noise brought my mother running from the kitchen. She extracted said needle from my brother’s mouth while no doubt checking for puncture wounds and I was taken back to bed with a sore bottom. Peace reigned over the household once more, but not for long: minutes later I was off again and got down the staircase for a second time, found another knitting needle and tried the whole thing all over again. It beggars belief why my brother let this happen twice. This time I was well and truly punished, but I must have got the message because I never tried it again. After that the needles disappeared, although you might say I had my own Weapons of Mass Destruction long before the phrase was coined.

Around the same time, my mother enrolled me in a French nursery school. In those days it was unusual for a child to attend any kind of pre-school or nursery, let alone a French one, but Mum loved the idea of me learning French and so off I went in the nursery uniform of a little white dress with matching socks and sandals.

The nursery was in a big house and we spent the day in a room filled with little wooden chairs. It had elegant French windows and a large stove, where we warmed ourselves while drinking our milk. During our break we played on the lawn outside and at lunchtime we sat at a long table covered in white linen and used proper knives and forks. The staff were strict but kind and insisted on good manners. I remember on at least one occasion being removed from the room after banging my spoon on the table and having to wait for lunch until all the others had eaten.

I soon learned to sing nursery rhymes and recite my times tables in French. We danced and sang a lot, which I loved, and I think of the two and a half years spent at the nursery as a wonderful time. I felt secure and happy there. Perhaps that’s why to my mind, ever since then that little white dress, socks and shoes have symbolised all things good, safe and comforting.

At the age of five I had to leave the nursery and move on to a beautiful private school, the Dorothy Grants, which meant swapping my white dress for an extremely smart navy-blue skirt, white shirt and tie, a navy blazer and a posh blue overcoat with silver buttons, topped with a Panama hat. My uniform was very much of that period and I thought it was fabulous. The school was in an elegant old house, the teachers were kind and I was extremely happy in this environment, where I shone and loved every minute of it. On summer days we would take our chairs outside and have classes under the trees in the garden, which was so much nicer than being indoors.

Sadly, though, I was taught a harsh lesson while at this school. One day I waited at the gates for my mother to collect me, not knowing she had sent a message to say she was going to be late. After a bit I decided to walk home. Even in those days this was a daft thing to do, but I was only six years old and I was sure I could find my way. As I walked through the unfamiliar streets, however, I started to panic: all the roads looked the same. I kept on walking and suddenly I became aware of five kids behind me. They began to shout things and made fun of my posh uniform.

Within minutes I was surrounded: three girls and two boys were shoving and pushing me. They pulled at my hair and grabbed my satchel, I lost my hat and then one of them tripped me up and I fell onto the pavement. I knew my hands were scraped and bleeding, but I didn’t cry. Instead I jumped up and started to run as fast as my little legs could carry me. The boys kept up with me, still hitting and calling me names, but I just ran and ran. As I turned a corner there was a main road in front and a bus stop with a large red double-decker standing with the door open. I made for that but the driver had already sussed out the situation and shot round to help me, clouting one of the lads as he ran by. At this, I clung to the driver and cried. He was so kind and cleaned my bruises, then asked me where I lived. I told him the address and he sat me down in his bus, closed the doors and drove me right to my house. My mother was frantic but so grateful to the bus driver, who accepted a cup of tea and left after giving me a big hug.

While I loved school I enjoyed my dance and drama classes even more. As soon as I could walk, Mum enrolled me in the local dance school, which was run by a lovely lady called Mavis Levy. By the time I was three I regularly appeared in all the school’s productions, singing, dancing and acting. I wasn’t shy and I loved it all, especially as it so often involved dressing up in pretty outfits. In fact, such was my passion for the costumes that on one occasion I was willing to turn to crime to get my hands on a particular favourite.

I was standing backstage behind another four-year-old wannabe, who was about to go on for a ballet number. She was wearing the most beautiful pink sequinned tutu, which I had been coveting. In a moment of jealous fury when no one was looking, I gave her a shove. Unfortunately she tumbled down the two stone steps leading to the dressing rooms and sprained her ankle. Her shrieks of pain brought the adults running, and my wish was granted: I was given the tutu and sent onstage to do the dance in her place. I was thrilled, but my triumph was short-lived because as soon as I came offstage I was very aware of fingers pointing from those in the know. My dastardly deed having been discovered, I was immediately suspended from the show for several nights.

Through this experience I learned yet another invaluable lesson in life: envy is bad, get there by your own efforts and not through someone else’s misfortune. And so I did: soon afterwards I was doing a regular star turn, wearing a long Victorian dress and a huge hat as ‘Little Miss Lady Make-Believe’, singing ‘You’ve Gotta Have Heart’. I was very proud of this achievement because I wanted to be a singer like Dad, but sadly, as far as singing was concerned, this turned out to be my finest hour and since then I’ve never quite matched it. Despite my best efforts, and to my great disappointment, I don’t have an amazing singing voice (in fact, people have been known to stuff fingers in their ears when I launch into song) and once I’d outgrown the cuteness factor that was that.

Although singing wasn’t my foremost talent, I loved it, and especially when I got to sing with my dad. He was still crooning à la Bing Crosby and sometimes he would take me along to gigs and we’d duet together: our favourite was ‘Something Stupid’, the song made famous by father-and-daughter duo Frank and Nancy Sinatra. Dad had a wonderful singing voice and so, despite my less-than-perfect pitch, together we were a good act.

I was a good dancer, though, and I loved dancing just as much as singing, if not more. My mother would make me sweet little outfits and I would tap or pirouette my way across the stage in show after show. Mum would drive me to wherever we were performing, my costumes piled in the back of the car. She was very proud and encouraged me to perform not only by making my costumes and ferrying me about but clapping enthusiastically in the audience, too.

My talent for comedy also emerged early, completely by accident. Aged four and a half, I was due to open a show with a tap routine in my little white skirt, red blazer and tap shoes. Unfortunately I was desperate for a wee but there wasn’t time for me to go before I had to be on stage. Unable to hold it in, I did a big wee in front of everybody. The audience fell about, but I was in no mood to enjoy it: I fled in tears, my big moment ruined.

It wasn’t until years later that I learned to love making people laugh and made my mark as a comic actress. Perhaps this was prophetic because despite my best intentions I was always getting involved in things that went wrong.

When I was six I had a couple more brushes with crime, this time trying my hand at embezzlement. I decided to start a tea club for my friends and managed to persuade five little girls to go home and extract half a crown each (a considerable sum of money in those days) from their mothers. In return for handing the cash over to me, I told them that they would each get a badge made from cardboard, a sugar sandwich and a drink of pop. Delighted with my haul, I stashed the half crowns in my dolls’ pram, dipping into the money every now and again to buy one of my favourite sherbet dips – you know the kind, with a liquorice straw – from the corner shop.

I might have got away with this little piece of fraud had it not been for another scheme of mine a few weeks later. One afternoon I informed my friends that we would put on a bring-and-buy sale for Oxfam, which meant they had to extract more money from their mothers. When I told my mother the same thing, she said, ‘That’s a good idea – I’ll help you put up some trestle tables and we’ll sort out lots of clothes and bric-à-brac,’ and she went on to invite the whole village.