A MOMENT TO REMEMBER - MEETING ONE OF MY FAVOURITES

Yes!!!! The photo above is a fabulous one I know!!! It's only fabulous because it's got the amazing Amanda Muggleton in it. I headed to Birmingham at the weekend and had a semi intimate (if you count 30 Prisoner Cell Block H fans) lunch with the legend herself. Some fellow Prisoner fans I know were also going so I was in good company. We arrived and were taken to a room with some of Amanda memorabilia and canapes were served to us with champagne and all the fans gathered in anticipation. Then a little while later, the lady herself appeared looking absolutely fabulous. She said she was terribly nervous but thrilled to see us and we had a toast as she was going to have a great afternoon with us. She answered some questions about the show and a few bits and bobs before we headed downstairs for the meal - I was determined to get a good seat and I headed straight for the top of the table. Everyone filed in and took their seat and the Q&A really began as lunch was being served and throughout lunch. She spoke candidly about her time on the show, someone actually asked how much she earned when starting on the show which I found a bit tacky.

Amanda spoke of her friends in Prisoner and she noted she didn't fall out with anyone really. She got an great with Val Lehman and adored Fiona Spence who it turns out became a lesbian after meeting Denise Morgan, one of the writers on the show. She also spoke fondly of Sheila Florance who played Lizzie and kept on talking about "that face" because of the facial expressions she would pull! Amanda did a mean impression of Patsy King who was governor Erica Davidson and laughed that Patsy could never remember her lines so would always walk over to the filing cabinet in scenes where she had written her lines. She spoke a lot about plays that she's done including Shirley Valentine and the fabulously successful "Steaming". Amanda also mentioned that she was up for the role of Madam Morrible in Wicked that eventually went to Maggie Kirkpatrick and she said she was really pleased for Maggie. After the lunch, we went to the bar and found Amanda there buying bottles of wine for us as we only had a glass with lunch which was so kind of her.

Then they had a quiz on Aussie Soaps. I thought this could be quite difficult as the people there were real Prisoner anoraks - they know everything about actresses and episode numbers and it was funny during the lunch to see people correct others about what happened on the show. So the quiz started and I think of myself as a decent guy on the subject of Aussie Soaps but I couldn't get the first 2 answers. However, I then rallied and got the rest of the answers without too much hassle. Amanda was amazed that I knew about Return To Eden for a start. So the results were called out and guess what?!! I won. Out of all those Prisoner geeks, I won!! I don't know if it's a compliment or an insult. So my prize was the UK edition of the first 32 episodes of Prisoner on dvd which was very nice. Then they did a tiebreaker question for some reason which again I got the answer to so won a photo of Amanda of my choice that she would sign.

When we got back upstairs, Amanda spent a good hour or so signing autographs and posing for pictures which you can see above, they also had an auction and I bid and won a cartoon of Chrissie dragging Santa into her cell - Amanda kindly wrote "It's Jaimie I want, not Santa, with love Amanda Muggleton!! I then asked her to be my new ringtone on my mobile phone so she spoke into it uttering her "What About My Baby Bea" infamous catchphrase. She was a real good sport and this showed at the end when she had a surprise for us all. My friend Barry runs the official Prisoner website and he had brought Amanda's original uniform from 30 years ago as she jokingly said she'd try it on. Well she did and the evidence can be seen below as she rolled back the years and Chrissie Latham was back in Wentworth - it really was something special to remember.

Everybody then said their goodbyes, I thanked Amanda for playing one of my all time favourite characters on Prisoner and the joy it gave me in meeting her and she was just lovely and so appreciative. She genuinely was astounded that we all made the effort to come and meet her in person. I am still on a high from it all and have some lovely photos of Amanda as Chrissie Latham signed to me. Just a brilliant afternoon and one I will cherish as Amanda Muggleton was so genuine and lovely. What a thrill.