Still Got It, Never Lost It!: The Hilarious Autobiography from the Star of TV’s Pineapple Dance Studios and Dancing on Ice. Louie Spence

was a water jug on the table, which surprised me. Why would you have water on the table when you could get it out of the tap? There was never room on our table at home for water, alongside the ketchup and brown sauce, and the salt and vinegar.

      One of the chairs alone in Julia’s kitchen would have filled our kitchen back in Braintree. They were large and made out of real wood. I thought everything looked real, none of it was fake. It was like seeing the actual furniture that ours at home was copied from. I didn’t know that tables could have wooden legs – I thought they all had metal legs. And I was frightened that I was going to mark a piece of the furniture, but it all seemed so natural to Julia.

      See, this is my point: bunking off school isn’t always a negative thing. I learned a lot that day. For one, I learned even though I may have been camper than the average kid on the block, I quite liked my banana as it was. And, two, just because something has a foreign name like moussaka, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give it a go, because I did – and I loved it.

      And I also learned a new word that day: couscous. Because I could, and because I can, because I did! It was also, on that day, I planned – along with John – another first. I say planned, but it was John, because he had already done it. Oh, what? I hear you ask, ‘Oh what, oh what, oh what?’

      Going to my first gay club. We were going to Heaven.