Dearest Fans
I've just finished appearing on BBC Three's "Upstaged" (www.bbc.co.uk/upstaged) performing for SIX hours live on-air!
My word! What an experience that was! Jason and I are thoroughly exhausted and relieved that we didn't win... it quite literally "took it out of us"! But THANK YOU nonetheless all those who viewed and voted and sent messages - it meant a lot to know you were all there!
I should just mention that Jason and I had never worked together as a duo before. In fact, my usual accompanist (Patrick O'Brien) had broken his hip and dear Jason quite literally had only 12 hours notice that I required his services before we appeared on air. In point of fact, we didn't know for certain we would be performing until 1030pm the night before as we had to wait on the result of the Carrivick Sisters to confirm whether or not we had to catch the 0706 to Bristol the next morning! We couldn't rehearse because Jason had prior teaching and rehearsal committments and so it was literally "live and unrehearsed"!
It was a great pity too that not more of the song requests and competition entries got through, but this was in part due to the fact that messages sent to my personal profile on the BBC website couldn't be accessed by the Production Crew... a great pity actually as there were some songs I would love to have sung and would've appreciated the prompt! There were also some song requests that did get through and I'm sorry we couldn't do them, especially those that are known as my "stock in trade" but we either didn't have the music or Jason was too nervous to sightread them on live telly - which is understandable!
I ge the impression too that some of the funniest moments were "beeped" out due to BBC compliance rules... these cover such things as branding etc... but we couldn't even mention the names of Community groups such as Jason's chorus or any of the networking sites I belong to... It would appear as well that I unknowingly spoke some double entendre that wasn't permissable either?!
All that said, Jason and I loved the experience... though were very relieved when it was finally all over! Jason - in order not to miss the early train - did not go to bed the night before and I had only managed three hours sleep myself due to last minute packing, arranging transport etc! But we must say that Endemol (the Production Co) looked after us superbly - as the stars we are - and couldn't have been more encouraging, helpful, kind etc!
So THANK YOU all once again for all your support, messages, commiserations etc... It helped knowing that you were all there egging us on through your TV or PC screens! "Can you feel the love tonight" was sung especially for you all as we certainly could feel your support!
One of the things that can get one down in retirement is time... free time, spare time, waste time... I have and can do all of those things with my time, but it can get tedious.
I used to wait for the Mobile Library with Joyce (Dame Joyce Rumelle) when she was living with me. I soon gave it up though as she used to hum to herself while waiting on the porch... it wasn't the humming per se that worried me but the looks she'd get from passers by at the front gate... On reflection, she might have appeared 'strange'. The other reason I stopped waiting was that their music section was a bit limited... after the tenth time of borrowing "Sing with Postman Pat" I really couldn't find any new inspiration from it and got a bit bored.
So what do I do with my time? Well... being older than I was last year, I find it slightly more difficult to do the things my young heart would like to do. For example, I'd love to go Bungee Jumping but I wouldn't like to trust my modesty to my knicker-elastic as it keeps getting looser with age.
