When I was 10 my parents took me to visit one of their clothing suppliers, a lady who lived in a village some distance away. She showed me the paddock behind her house and introduced me to her little racing pony, Whiskey. He was very young and hadn’t yet got used to a saddle but she let me ride him and we got along fine. Of course I fell in love and begged my parents to buy him for me. Generously, they agreed, and Mum said we could come back the following day with the horsebox to take him home. Typical me, I was having none of it: I didn’t want to wait, I was eager to take him home right away.
‘I’ll ride him home,’ I announced.
‘But it’s 22 miles,’ countered Mum. ‘That’s too far for you and for the pony.’
I wasn’t giving up, though, and eventually my parents agreed to let me ride him home, with them following behind in the car. We did it, but what a crazy stunt – it took so long that it grew dark. Whiskey and I plodded along in the car’s headlights. Home at last, Whiskey was bedded down in the stable, thankfully none the worse for his adventure because a ride that long might have damaged his legs. As for me, I was jubilant at having made it back with him, but completely exhausted.
The next day I set out to introduce Whiskey to Tinto (who was in the field behind the stables). As we approached, Tinto looked round at Whiskey and then at me. Nostrils flared and eyes blazing, he began galloping towards us. I backed out of the field fast! Tinto was jealous and most definitely not coming over to make friends with Whiskey. In fact, I think he had murder on his mind.
From then on, Tinto was like a spoilt child whose nose has been put out of joint. He was so aggressive towards Whiskey that it was months before we could put them in the field together. When we eventually did so, Whiskey held his own with Tinto (who stopped trying to bully him) and the two became partners in crime. Together, they escaped from their field and destroyed the graveyard next door, something that got them – and us – into all sorts of trouble.
One evening, a couple of years after I got Whiskey, I was mucking out in the stable when I heard a loud thud, followed by a deep shudder and sigh.
‘What was that?’ I asked the friend who was with me, too scared to look.
‘It’s Whiskey,’ she told me, after peering into his stable. ‘He’s lying on the ground and he doesn’t look right.’
I rushed in to find Whiskey lying down, which was unusual as horses seldom do this. Immediately, I convinced myself that he had a twisted gut (which can be fatal) and so I ran back to the house to phone the vet, certain my beloved pony was dying. The vet told me that he wouldn’t be able to come out for some time and so I settled down to wait beside Whiskey, gently placing an arm around him and resting my head on one side of his rib cage. He remained perfectly still, not moving a muscle, and after what seemed hours I fell asleep and was oblivious to Mum, who came in every now and then to check on us.
When the vet eventually arrived, early the next morning, I got up to tell him what had happened, and to my amazement Whiskey suddenly stirred, blew through his nose and got up.
After looking him over, the vet said: ‘There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this horse.’
‘But I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘He was so ill and he didn’t move a muscle all night.’
‘How could he?’ he laughed. ‘You were lying on top of him and he was clearly too much of a gentleman to disturb you.’
I was so happy to learn that Whiskey was fine that I didn’t even mind feeling a complete idiot for calling out the vet to a horse who was apparently just taking a nap.
Not only was Whiskey totally fine, he continued to be in the best of health for the next few years. I rode both him and Tinto almost daily, rushing in after school to see them and take them treats. And I was a totally fearless rider: I loved jumping and would career around the paddock, going over our homemade jumps or take off for long rides in the local lanes.
Sadly, my riding career came to an abrupt end when I was 16 years old and had an accident on Tinto. He had a bad habit of stopping every now and then, lowering his head so that I slid off down his neck. He’d done this a few times, but never when he was moving fast, and so I’d simply scold him and climb back on. This time, though, we were riding by the river when something spooked him. From a gentle trot, he launched into a madcap gallop but suddenly stopped and lowered his head so that I shot straight off him and hit the ground hard. I might have got away with a few nasty bruises, had my foot not been caught up in the stirrup. Meanwhile, Tinto took off again, dragging me along the ground with him. No doubt realising something was wrong, he didn’t go far, and once he’d stopped I was able to disentangle myself.
I was hurting all over but somehow I managed to get hold of the reins. Limping and in pain, I very slowly and carefully led him home. Once he was safely in his stable, I told Mum what had happened and she took me to the doctor. Luckily, no bones were broken: I was just grazed, battered and bruised. Unfortunately the accident made me fearful in a way I’d never been before, and although I did ride again I was never able to recapture the same fearless joy. Now I was cautious and the horses could smell my fear and subsequently played up.
Despite the accident, I never stopped loving horses. I haven’t lost that addiction to the sniff of a saddle, as I call it – horsey readers out there will know exactly what I mean. Horses are still very special to me and I have a close connection with a horse sanctuary in Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire: Only Foals and Horses. For many of the horses and ponies there, the sanctuary is the only safe place they have ever known. Many have suffered fear, pain and mistreatment. Some, including newborn foals dumped when their mothers were sold, have been rescued from auctions, where they were being sold for meat. I do what I can to help, and when Carol McGiffin (my fellow presenter on Loose Women) and I won £75,000 on Celebrity Who Wants to be a Millionaire? I was able to donate my half to the sanctuary.
Back in the days when I lived for my horses I couldn’t bear to be separated from them for longer than twenty-four hours and so, when my parents decided that I should join Brett at boarding school (at the age of 11), naturally I was horrified.
Boarding school? Not if I had anything to do with it.
Chapter Three
The problem was that I’d failed my 11 Plus. Well, to be fair, I didn’t even know the test we took one day was all that important. I’d sit through most lessons gazing out of the window, not listening. To this day, I still have nightmares of sitting at that desk, not having done my homework, with not a clue as to what anyone is talking about. I always blame the teachers and too many kids to a class. It was a shame, though it meant I couldn’t get into any of the good local schools, so it was the secondary modern or boarding school for me.
My parents took me on another visit to Brett’s school (it was a boys’ school, but they were just starting to allow female siblings in) and it was 300 boys to 20 girls. I was shown the dormitory in the small girls’ wing, which had been placed as far away as possible from the boys’ section of the school.
One look at that dorm settled it: I wasn’t going to share a room with several other girls I didn’t know. I’d always hated school, so how on earth could I go and live in one? My parents agreed that I could attend the school as a day pupil; it involved an hour-long journey each way, but for me this was a much better option. And so it was that in the autumn of 1962, just before I turned 12, I set off for The Rodney School in my smart red and grey uniform. I loved the uniform and the ballet lessons, and once in a while we would have dances in the big hall. The boys would sit on one side of the room, the girls on the other; the boys would have to come over and ask us to dance and it was all very formal but we got to wear pretty party frocks, which was the bit I liked.
The grounds were absolutely beautiful and on hot summer days our school fairs were fantastic. I also remember having choral concerts outside. It’s funny how the summers seemed longer and hotter when we were young.