Begin Again with Davina McCall - Andi Oliver: Grief, Racism, and the 35-Year Journey to Heal from the Loss of My Brother

Episode Date: April 17, 2025

In this episode of Begin Again, Davina McCall sits down with old friend and renowned chef and TV personality, Andi Oliver, to discuss the challenges that shaped her life and career. Andi opens up about her difficult childhood, her early experiences with racism, and the impact these had on her journey. She reflects on her time in the pioneering band Rip Rig + Panic and the profound loss of her older brother, Sean, whose passing led Andi to struggle with an eating disorder. Through it all, Andi has repeatedly reinvented herself, embracing the ethos that “you just have to do it, even if it scares you.” In this candid conversation, Andi shares how she has navigated grief, growth, and the constant reinvention of her life, emerging as a powerful and inspiring figure who continues to face each challenge with resilience and determination. 📢 Drop a comment: What’s your biggest takeaway? Follow me here: www.instagram.com/beginagain https://www.tiktok.com/@beginagainpod  (00:00) Intro   (02:33) Davina and Andi Reunite   (03:31) Childhood Memories   (04:10) Growing Up in Cyprus   (09:21) Returning to 70s Britain: Racism and Escapism   (14:41) Moving to London at 16: A New Beginning   (24:59) Motherhood, Career Risks, and Personal Growth   (28:32) London’s Music Scene and Meeting Neneh Cherry   (31:08) Ancient & Brave Ad   (45:15) Impact of Sickle Cell and the Death of Andi's Brother Sean   (46:37) Coping With Loss: Remembering Sean Oliver   (54:00) Overcoming an Eating Disorder and Rediscovering a Love for Food   (01:06:21) Finding Broadcasting   (01:20:56) Cooking as Art and Creative Expression   (01:24:22) Andi and Miquita’s Journey Through the Caribbean   (01:26:06) Overcoming Fear and Hosting Primetime TV   (01:30:34) The Journey To Self Love (01:44:52) Key Takeaway's   Sponsored by: Ancient + Brave - https://ancientandbrave.earth/pages/planet  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You were a natural choice for this podcast because of all the times you've picked yourself up, you've dusted yourself off, and you've started all over again. I lost my brother. I just remember a voice that you've got to come to the hospital now and as soon as they walked through, I knew. And then I grabbed him

and I could tell he wasn't in there. He was cold. The worst moment of my life. Do you know what, Andy? How lovely. We're still feeling the hole that Sean left. The people we lose are stardust, and they live in us. Grief will never go away, but you'll find somewhere to keep it.

But it did hit you hard. The pain of losing Sean turned into me compulsively eating. I could not stop. Someone took me to see a doctor. He said you've got a compulsive eating disorder. Were you scared of getting better? Not allowing fear to be the thing that stops you from doing things is very important. Even if it terrifies you, do it.

In fact, the more it terrifies you, the more. more you should do it. This is what I love about you. Hi, I'm so excited about today because I am talking to Andy Oliver. She is a really, really old friend of mine. I've known her for about 40 years and we are going to be talking through her incredible life where she has pivoted and begun again time after time after time. She's amazing. If you like this episode, if it would be all right, can you just click like? which is really easy and quick to do and subscribe. Lots of people think in some way subscribing, especially if you're one of my fans and you're in a mid-lifer,

we think subscribing means it's going to cost you money. It doesn't cost you any money. It's completely free. But subscribing just means that you get the latest episode the minute it comes out. So subscribing is great for you and it's really great for us. I quickly just want to add a little trigger warning because we do discuss, suicide ideation and also eating disorders.

I feel like at the beginning of this chat, I should do some sort of like government health warning. Because I'm a trigger warning. Because I know you. And so it's going to feel maybe and sound quite familiar to people because I know you. But what I am going to try and do is ask you lots of questions that I might know the answer to,

but I know that the answer is what people will want to hear. And I am going to try to also be conscious of remembering that people don't know us or everything that we've been through. So I might explain things a bit sometimes. And I wonder, I don't know if people know that we know each other. No, I'm not sure that everybody does. I think sometimes they do. I'm not sure they know that we know each other as we do.

And how long we've known. And how deeply connected. Yes. So shall we start? Yes, please. What are your first memories then of us meeting? Interesting. Like Wag Club.

That's exactly what I said earlier. The Wag Club, you being this like teenager essentially. I mean, I was probably almost a teenager I would imagine. I don't even know because I don't think I had. Dad I had Mikita by the day? I'm not even sure you had. I was very young. You were very young.

I can't. If I had had my key, she can't have been more than about one or two years old, right? So I would have been 20, 21, which means you were probably about, like, you were late teens or something. How old do you know? Late teens, 57. Yes, so you would, and I'm 61. So, you know, you might have been like 18 or 17. I may have been just before I had my keys.

I may have been 19 or something. Anyway, you were very young, tiny little skirts, legs, what enthusiasm, just this bound us like a sort of mad, puppy, very excited, incredibly happy puppy bounding around in the wag club. And I was kind of the same. Me and Anna were very similar to that. I think we all had quite an energy that matched each other on a really good level, in fact. And I think there were loads of boys and loads of girls, obviously, but there were some girls that were drawn to each other energetically.

And you were part of that ball of kind of... kind of tumble of energy from the wag. That's what I remembered first. That's exactly what I remember. I said earlier to somebody, I said you and Nenna together, I was like worshipping at the altar of cool hotness. I was like, oh, God, these girls are like,

I wanted to like absorb you in some way. And then obviously we had, the connection via Bruce. So I went out with a guy called Bruce for ages and he had been married to Nena. And what was quite funny was it was like all okay for us to all be friends. Yes, because I think that there was a real, the way that we all approached life was with no rigidity.

Yes. There was no idea. There was certainly no kind of idea that it was nan's ex-husband. So we could, I mean, we weren't children. you know, it wasn't a school. I think, you know, I think we all felt that life came with challenges and changes and family was quite fluid. We all came from fairly fluid familial structures anyway.

You know, we were in some ways the lost ones, you know, who came together to make a solid base for each other. You know, I feel that we were like sort of spiritual nomads a bit, like wandering in some kind of desert and that we all found each other because we needed to create a new town, a place, a structure within which we could all live and feel like we were connected to something. And do you know what I mean?

And I think that kind of happened. But that's what it feels in my gut when I think about it. I feel like we were the children of punk and that the liberation that punk gave people societally was incredibly important. And that liberation was not just about music. It was about the idea of humanity and how that humanity, how humanity should look and how family should look and how people should feel in the company of each other and how our children should be and what they should expect and how we should all help and support each other. And I still believe in all of those tenants, tenants, really.

Do you know, Andy, that is probably the best description. of that time for me that I've ever heard. I've often tried to explain it to people. It's quite hard to explain to people. It was such a special time of love and acceptance of everyone and everything in our group. I know outside the parameters of that group was a savage world for many.

And our world was quite savage too. Our world was also quite savage. It wasn't all sunshine and roland. by any means, but I think that what there was always somebody there to catch you is what I felt like. And I still feel like that, actually. I feel like I'm lucky enough to live in a world where there's always someone to catch you. Sometimes I do the catching, sometimes the catcher, sometimes I'm the catchee, you know, depending on what week it is and what day, the bloody month we're talking about.

But I think that that's how it's kind of like when I was a kid, that's kind of what I wanted my world to look like. without being able to really articulate that. And then as I, you know, I left home and, you know, came to London quite early on, etc. And then I remember meeting, see, my house at home, my house was always open house. We had a very, it was a weird house, all sorts of quite difficult things going on. But there was always an open door policy somewhat, like the school band that my brother was in rehearsed in our house. You know, if anybody needed someone to say they would come and stay with us, If someone had a fight with their mum and dad, they would come and stay with us.

My friend Sue and Louise used to spend most weekends over our house if I wasn't at their house. But it kind of happened to us a lot. You know, we'd have massive sleepovers. Mum was very, like we had a party once. I always told people at this birthday party. It made me and my brother kings and queens of school one year. This was when we lived in Cyprus, actually. And the birthday party was that my mum, basically, it was, I think it was my brother's birthday party.

So whenever we had a birthday part, you were allowed like four friends as well. You know, so me it was like me and three of my mates and all of my brother's mates. And my mum basically split us up into two armies, rolled up newspaper, blocked off the road to traffic at each end, and created these two kid armies and just went, go! And we battered each other with newspapers. It was just this like absolute carnage in the street. The whole street was covered in ripped up paper. and then we went upstairs and had a huge picnic out in the back garden in so it was.

And at school, we were literally kings and queens of the school because my mum basically, she was a teacher. So she understood the child's spirit and need for chaos and would give it to us every now and again. And I think that that chaos and that kind of wild thing that you, well, I used to crave it as a child. Craver as an adult as well, actually. that that spirit was something I wanted to have as part of my life

it was like I knew that you were allowed that and it was okay actually it wasn't something to be scared of to have that kind of wild unfettered passionate engagement in the day or the moment or in your endeavour whatever it is that you chose and that's something I'm always grateful to my mum for you mentioned that this was happening in Cyprus. Yes. You actually moved there when you were really young because your dad, yeah. Yeah, your dad was in the RAF.

Uh-huh, that's right. So we got posted. Before that, we lived in Biggin Hill in Kent. Big and Hill. I remember Biggin Hill quite well, actually. You know, you get like slivers of memory, like little photo snaps. Yeah. I remember.

There's three things I remember. One is that I used to go to school in the control tower, like an old RIF airplay. and control house it was completely round and i used to go up these circular steps spiral circuits to get to the school which is amazing classroom which is on the top and i loved it up there because you could see all the way around so it was lovely and then i remember walking home from school with the sun dappling through the leaves of a tree and just really like watching the light play against my skin as i walked through it's still one of my favorite things in the world you know me drive through it uh in the summertime, I love the English summertime countryside. I just want to, the smell of the grass,

that verdant, deep green and all of it. I think, and I think it comes from being a kid in Kent, idyllic, kind of bucolic idea of British countryside. I loved it so much. The Garden of England. I remember going swimming and having Savalois. That's what I remember about Kent. It's really weird. And then we went to live in Cyprus. And I got to Cyprus and I loved it there. Why? It was hot for a start. I didn't know I liked to be, I liked the sunshine. I got them and I was like, what is this?

That's better. This is way better. And we went to the beach every weekend. And we used to go to school. We used to start school really, really, really early at like 7 a.m. So we'd get up at like 5.30 in the morning or something. Get to school at 6.30, 7 in the morning. But you'd finish at 12 in the summer and 1 in the winter.

Wow. So you'd have the whole day. I think our holidays were shorter or something. But you'd have the whole day to do stuff. So we were very physical there. We were outside a lot. We were doing things all the time. There was a kind of swimming.

I swam all the time, like in the sea, in the pool. We lived opposite of like a rec centre place. It was to go swimming all the time. I was obsessed with it. And there was just something about running around in the sunshine, being outside, that kind of living really was. for my temperament. Can I ask you something?

Because obviously the whole premise of this podcast is about beginning again. And it's like really moving country at such a young age. It's like your first experience of beginning again. That transition, did it teach you? Do you feel like there are lessons that you learn from moving from Kent to Cyprus? I think the lessons I learned were when I came back.

Right. Because that was a happy transition and it was easy. To Cyprus. Yes. Coming back. back from Cyprus to the UK was really hard. Right. For a start, I didn't really remember it here very much.

And I kept saying, I want to go home, meaning Cyprus. And everybody was going, you are home. And I was like, I don't understand. How old were you when you came back? Nine. Okay. And it just felt dark and cold. People were calling me names.

I experienced racism. You'd never experienced it before? I don't think so. Not memorably. I had a teacher that used to call me you people when I was in Cyprus and I didn't really know what she meant and I was a weird woman called Miss Scotford and I just used to think what does she mean

she kept saying that and I didn't really know what she meant and then I came back to England and people were, it was slurs like horrible things that felt violent. Where did you move to when you came out? What was it? Brise Norton we came to and we came to London briefly and then we went to Suffolk.

All right. It was East Anglia, Barry St. Edmonds in the 70s. And that was no joke. And, you know, that parts of the UK back then in that time, it was bleak. You know, I go to Barryson, it was now as a completely different place.

There's people from all over the world there. I was the only black girl in my school. It was really bleak. People were calling me names. I felt scared. I started having nightmares. I thought there was something under the bed. You know, all of those kind of creepy.

I remember seeing a film of the hunchback of Notre Dame, a really old black and white one with Charles Laudette. It's a really old one and I watched it, scared the bejesus out of me. And I started to have a nightmare, like proper nightmares, waking, sweating, absolutely terrified. And every single night I was having these horrible dreams. And the light, I remember the most was the light. It was the darkness.

Yes. I found really difficult. And that darkness somehow seeped into my very being. So that was really the first difficult transition in my life, I think. We all have them. I had different points, but that was, that was, that was, it was traumatic. How did you cope? Because I know you didn't really tell your parents about the racism or.

I didn't tell anyone because, and I, I keep thinking about why I didn't tell them. Because it didn't even occur to me really until quite recently that I haven't even spoken to anyone about it. And I think a bit of me wanted to protect them. I didn't want them to know it was so hard because I didn't really think it was anything that anybody could do about it. felt like a monster that had been unleashed that nobody could control or do anything about because I think somewhere in me I think I felt I deserved it. Wait, wait. Yeah.

I want to unpick that some. I feel like, I think I felt like they were right. You know? I know. That's the, the most insidious thing about racism is that you believe. it. And so what you're left with is an internal belief that you are inherently wrong, that there's something just wrong with the very core of who you are and your being. And that went in really early and I didn't know how to shift that. And I think that's why I didn't tell anyone about it because

it felt like I would then have to talk about what was wrong with me. I know. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I guess I've kind of, I've always understood how hateful judging somebody in any way really is. I mean, I always say for me, because I've messed up so many times, like I can't judge anybody about anything. Right. Same way. Right. But I'd never thought of it that calling someone a name or doing that would make them call. question, like, then believe that that is what?

It felt like, it felt like the veil had dropped and everybody, and I suddenly realized that there was something really wrong with me, that I just wasn't what you're meant to be, wasn't what you're meant to be, who you're meant to be, and everything about me was inherently wrong. So I could never talk about it to anyone. I mean, I talked to my friend Sue about it, who is still my dear friend

and then since I was nine when I started my school Wesley Middle School Sue had been there for maybe two months so she was the new girl as well and then we discovered her birthday was a day before mine oh wow so she's the 25th

and I'm 26 and we sort of you know when you're little that kind of stuff's really magical and important and it's still nice now so I would talk to Sue about it and I would talk to Louise about it because we just were like three little acorns you know

but I didn't really talked to anybody else but I certainly didn't talk to any grown-ups about it. So how did you manage? Because it was quite a long time really before you left and went to London. How did you manage those years of your life? I don't know, Davina. I just was like a high-functioning, terrified person. I was terrified all the time and like battling with a kind of, um, self-discussed all the time, you know, whilst trying to grow up. Yeah.

And learn stuff at school. And puberty. And puberty and all of that stuff, you know. So in the midst of that, there was a constant internal dialogue going on and on and on. Were you like, I am going to escape? I'm out of here. Yeah. I was like, I was waiting for my life to stuff.

I've said that before. It's like I just spent the whole time waiting for other ways that my life. I could take shape. I didn't have to be resigned to staying there. Yes. Being called disgusting things all the time. You know, I was like overtly sexualized

by adult men, you know, at a very young age. Really? Really? Down the road saying weird jungle bunny sex things to me. I was like 12. I had, you know, I had matured very early. I had boobs and a bum and all of that. And I walked down the road and grown men would be saying,

propositioning me. sexually and I didn't really even understand what they meant but I knew it scared me you know I've been walking home from school like literally go I remember my mate's dad like just awful terrifying things like now I know if I was a young girl I knew that was going through that I would just gather her up and take it to safety but you know my mum didn't know it was happening my dad didn't know something my dad was bipolar anyway and there was all sorts of stuff going on with him my mom was not aware it was going on like I've talked to her about it since And she's like, my God, I can't believe I didn't know.

She's like, why didn't you tell me? I still don't really have an answer for her, you know. Is it, is it that you are a fiercely independent person? And it's like, it's just happening. I've just got to handle it. A bit of a bit, definitely, that was definitely a part of it. Definitely a part of it. And my mother taught me to be a fiercely independent person.

Right. And to power through things, you know. So, you know, she took, my mum talked. me how to respond physically to protect myself if a man tried to touch me or grab me when I was 11 years old. She was like, you know, she taught me, she said, let them come closer, let them come and you grab them, you grab them by the bulls first and then you, and when they come down, like you grab them by the ears and you pull your knee up and then you run. And she taught me that when I was 11 and she herself was taught how to fight back against racist when she was,

when she first came to this country, she was really young. She was early 20s and somebody taught her that you run to a house in, you know, there were loads of little streets then and everybody had milk bottles outside the house. You run a house, run up the path, grab the milk bottles, smash them against the door, keep your back to the door, and then you hold the bottles here. And then anybody coming at you, you have a weapon. And she had to learn that when she was a young girl and she just got to this country. So she taught me how to fight. She taught me to be a fighter. She taught me to verbally know how to protect myself. I'm quite dexterous with language, you know. You are very dexterous.

And she taught me that very young. Where was your grandmother at this time? Because I know you were super, you were super close to her. No, but the thing about Mama is I only met Mama two or three times in my life. Oh, really? Yeah, she was in Canada or she was in Antigua. We didn't ever have the money to go. But she had this thing where she would send me messages from Canada.

She knew, she understood me. Because people in my family were always talking about. I was, you know, fairly lively. and so she was always going messages about me and my behaviour and she would send me messages going don't listen to them do what you like basically from Toronto and from Antigua she sent me little dolls and send me messages saying be true to yourself be your own guide listen to your internal voice

live with your heart follow your heart how much did that mean to you and did it did you absorbed, did you get that? Absolutely, because I also got the same messages for my mother, even though I was always in trouble. She was also always going, listen to your heart, lead with your heart, listen to your internal voice. Because you know, you know, you know what's right and what's wrong. I'm so into that at that moment. Yeah. Ask yourself the question and you will hear the answer. My gut, well, as every single time in my life told me which way to go, every time I don't listen to it, I end up in the shit.

Whether it's a job, whether it's a boyfriend, whether it's a mate, whether it's a party, you know, every time I go, well, and brush it away, it's absolutely the wrong thing to do. I am, I was, I read, well, first of all I want to say, what was lovely about doing this interview was, I got notes about you, hilarious, like, I was like, I know, Andy, but no, but what was so funny, was I was reading the notes. I was like, what? I didn't know that. Well, I guess I met you.

You were like late teens, early 20s. And pre that, we just used to talk about what was happening. I never really went deep into your past or anything. I didn't realize how old you were when you came to London. Right. And am I right in saying you were 16? Yes, 17. 17, 17.

16, 17. Yeah. Which I really like talking about this nowadays because, when you think about, I'm never sure what this generation of young people is called X, Y, Z, whatever. Young people now. The idea of leaving home and moving to London

at 16 or 17 is so alien. And as a parent, helicopter parenting, you wouldn't let your kid do that. You'd be like, there's no way you're going to the big smoke on your own. And then I saw that, you'd moved into a squat with some friends. Everybody was in a squat with their friends. It was perfectly normal things.

Everybody did was my cousins had a squat and I was into it. Best thing ever. Like, can you just explain to people? What a squat was? Because there's just no such thing. A squat was a house that was a free basically because you just, you basically took over abandoned properties or empty properties. And London then, there were loads of empty houses all over the place

that people weren't living in. So you would move in, people used to. I don't even know how they got the electricity on. You'd kind of get an electricity meter or they'd plum into some weird things. It just happened. And do it. There was gas on. There was electricity on.

While you had the gas and electricity on, you were good to go, basically. Some of them didn't have the electricity on and were a bit cold. They were misery squats. We didn't really have a misery squad. We had nice squats. They were good. And then you'd have squatters rights and there was all sorts of things. And then those, actually, a lot of those squats became what used to be called co-op houses.

and they were like small housing cooperations that were put together by an independent group of people and then you would legally actually take ownership of those houses. And fortunately they got turned into housing associations which then the council bought and then they just became part of the council. The council. Whatever they call it government property stock, government housing stock. So unfortunately those co-ops kind of didn't last that long. but for the period of time it was fantastic

because you know how young people now can't afford to leave home we just left home and found ourselves living independently it was absolutely brilliant how many of you were there in the squat one two three four maybe eight in a great big house in like a sort of five floor house in the back of Dahlston near Cannerbury kind of thing that was the first I've lived in a few

everybody lived in a few you know it was a very free time. It was a very, that was another transition, I suppose. Well, beginning again by moving to London was massive. Beginning again by moving to London was massive. But I literally was chomping at the bit. I could not wait. And the moment I turned 16,

I was like, right, I'm legally allowed to go now. I mean, you know, you were saying, you know, parents allowing there was no allowing or not allowing. I was just gone. I used to climb out the back window and run away at the time. My poor mother, honestly, I was a night, I acknowledge it. But,

Can I just say something? Look at you now. I know. And all of that, I think sometimes it's quite nice to say to any parents listening or watching that your kid might be going through a lot of trauma, turmoil now. And seem quite lost. And seem a bit lost. But actually this is what makes someone.

Yeah. And sometimes that's happening because they've got a lot to offer. They've got a lot going on and they can't wait to start life. Yeah. And sometimes Nana always says not everybody's good at being little. Like she used to say it about Makita. She was like, McKee was just now very good at being little.

And she was terrible at being there. McGee was like, she was quite wild. Not very good at being little. You know, I'm not very good with like automatic authority has never sat easily with me or particularly well with me. I remember being at school, you know, and my teachers would say, because I say so and I think, you're an idiot. I'd have no respect for you.

So why would I do what you're telling me to do? It's like my uncle John, he met my uncle John. I'm sure you met my uncle John. Was he at your sixth year? Yes, he was. And he was one of the first black headmasters in this country, my uncle John. He's an extraordinary man.

And my uncle John would tell me to do something, but he would sit me down and explain to me what was going on and why I needed to do something differently, and I would always do it. And do you know why? Because he had respect for me. I was just going to say respect. Yeah.

And he was always, always treating me like that since I was little. He would sit down and ask me how I was, what I thought about it, and understand what I, you know, having a conversation and proper exchange with me. And I just always needed that. I can't, I don't respond to someone just barking orders at me and telling me what to do. I've not been very good at it. I love that idea that some people aren't good at being little. Some people need to be out in the world.

Yeah. I think if you, if it scares you, I think you just have to make sure they know there's a safe place for them to come and land when they need it. You know. And trying to keep them home, it doesn't help. It doesn't mean that they're not going to go out and do things that scare you or that challenge them. It just means that they're going to get resentful with you. Yeah. So even if they're, if it scares you how your child is, even if it scares you, you still have to let them do those, the things.

that they're reaching for. You know, if they want to go to Paris for a year or they want to do whatever it, you've got them and get on with it. So you don't own them. What did you do when you came to London? Because was that when music was like, okay? Yeah, for a bit, I think.

I mean, it wasn't that long before I joined Riprigan Panic, I've got to say, which was the band I was in when I was a teenager. I've just got to say, we've got to just, like, stop for a moment and discuss Rick and Panic because it was the coolest band ever. because it was sort of like it's talked about like it's a punk band and the ethos and the vibe of it was punk but there was also so much groove

and groove like funk and everything they were amazing you were amazing really like a collective more than just a band yeah it was quite a collective yeah it was like lots of different moving and people would come and go and guest them and at the heart of it there was like six of us I suppose

it was sort of Gareth and Sean Bruce me, Nana, Springer. And then there was Flash and all sorts of other people that would come and go basically around that kind of nucleus. And I mean, you were pretty big. Yeah, so. I mean, I don't really, you know, we never really thought about that stuff, which is quite interesting.

It's probably why we weren't bigger because we didn't really think in music business terms and we didn't really, the music business per se was not really the reason we were doing any of it. It was very much a need to express ourselves in a particular way. And for me, I'm eternally grateful. I see it as that Gareth, who really was the founder of the band, was like my music teacher, you know, and to have had that musical education at such a young age was brilliant.

Because it taught me, you know, we would, me and Nana were like sort of dervishes on the stage, really. We just used to just fly. So honestly, I just, I wish I could like explain to people. because both of you bought a little bit of like kind of African dance moves, like vibe. And I'd never seen girls like perform. Yeah, I had never. I was like, this is the sexiest thing I've ever seen my life.

I was telling somebody about this other day and I was like, well, we just used to take up, we never used to wear shoes and we used to tuck our dress into your nicks. Yeah, into your side. Yeah, yeah, it was so cool. It took everything into our knickers and just fly about basically. I saw these pictures the other day, and I was thinking, well, that's a lot of pennies. She was like, it's just loads of pictures of me and that is bum, basically. Amazing.

And for us, it felt, you know, these two young women, you know, we were like any other young women in that we were trying to work out who we were and parts of us were very confident and fearless and felt really powerful. And bits of us were really insecure and freaked out, you know. What was that like when you met, Nana? It was kind of like two magnets, really. So Sean had had a car crash. Sean and Gareth had a car crash, and Sean was in hospital at the Middlesex Hospital, I think. So how old were you when you met now?

She was 17, I was 18, about, or she was 16 and I was 17, like literally babies. And she had been telling her about me. And he'd been telling me about her. He kept going, you've got to meet this girl. I'm going to love each other, you're going to love it, you're going to love it, you're going to love, and I was like, whatever. Yeah, yeah. You know, when someone else is telling you as well, you're like, whatever, shut up.

And I walked into the hotel, I went into the hotel, I walked into the hospital room. And she was, she'd go to and read him from this book every day because he had his leg in a, what did they call that? A cast. Oh, oh, yes. It was in traction. So he couldn't get out of bed for about three months. So she used to go and read him every day out of this book and talk to him. her hair basically

and I came down so I probably was 17 because I just just moving to London I was just moving to London I was just moving and I walked in and she was sitting and we kind of looked at her and I went hi and I said you must be that girl

she said she was thinking oh you're the sister and we talked a little bit and then I said do you want a fag I don't I mean I don't even smoke neither does she we must have been shorn cigarettes got a cigarette went in the hall

this is how long ago I was, went in the hallway of the hospital and had a fact. Love it. And just were like, you're pretty cool,

you're pretty cool. And we came back in and I think Gareth was there as well and we said, so we're going to sing together. And they were like, what? And we said,

we decided we're going to sing together and we were like, arms linked. Do you know like little girl when little girls fall in love with each other? Me and Sarah. Yes.

It's exactly what happened. It's exactly what happened. I just knew. Yeah, you just know. When you know, you know. Yeah.

of all very when Harry met Sally. And we fell in love with each other on the spot. I always say Nana's all my greatest love affairs and my life really. One of your most successful. Most successful. Look still going. Easier than any dude. Right.

And more consistently, you know, easy than any man. And I think girlfriends and I'm pretty sure Nana would have done this to you as well. Sarah's definitely done it to me. They can tell you things that no one else can tell you. Oh, absolutely. Because you know they love you. and you know that that love is so pure that they can tell you some of the hardest truths.

Nana has definitely been tasked with speaking to me. Like, now listen, so-and-so is pissed off with you. They've sent me. This is why? And I'm like, why don't talk to yourself? And they're like, because she's scared of you. And she's like, yeah, what are we going to do about it? Do you know what I mean?

It's like she's, and I've done the same with her because people don't want to tell her anything, you know. I remember when she'd first became hugely famous on her own. And she'd been on tour and I've missed her so much. She'd been away. Because we were like in each other's pockets every day. Every day, right? Yeah, I mean, you had an n-in between your names.

Yeah, Andy Nanna. Yeah. It's true. Right? It's true. We did. And people very rarely said that one name without your name. Never.

Never. Nana and Andy coming, exactly. And she's been away, for. like three months or something and she came back and we were in our house and we were doing something, cooking probably and she said something and I went oh shut up and she started laughing

and I said why are you laughing? She said no one told me to shut up for three months because she'd been with all these like kiss asses and I was like oh what a lot of shit shut up and she just like love she went oh God I miss you so much every kiss in my ass with three months you know and

so yeah you are you are the one who can say you are one with the, who is safe. Yeah. She's my safe person. You know, she's my person. And that happened really quickly. So we fell in love with each other.

Inside we were going to sing together. About two months later, the Slits were playing at a place called the venue. So let's just explain the Slits. The Slits were like, coolest band ever. So Sean's girlfriend Tessa played bass. Tessor. In the Slits. So it's all very family.

So all interlinked. Yeah. And Nana was singing with the Slits. And I went to this gig and I was down the front because I was a massive slits fan before I had even met any of them. They slits played in Bereson-Edlands

when I was really young and punk changed my life. The Clas and the Slits played and I was like, that's it, I'm living like that. So one of the things that brought me to London was the idea of the Clash and the Slits. And so I went to this gig,

I was like, oh, I love the Slits. Oh, that girl I met singing with the Slits. I don't think Sean was playing with them that night. I can't remember. He used to play with them sometimes. Bruce may have been playing drums for me too because Bruce, who was the drummer in Rick, a panic also

yeah the Smiths and at the end of the gig Nana and Ari reached down and pulled me up onto the stage

and I think it was great vine or whatever it was they were singing and then they just like get on the mic and shoved me at the mic and then we all just started

dancing and you know it was like I just was like ah this is right this is what I meant to be doing it didn't feel weird

it didn't feel like scary I was just like in my shit I was like and I was like and I I felt like I'd finally landed where I was meant to be,

did this kind of crazy couple of last songs with them, did the encore with them. And at the end of the gig, Gareth from Rick Wiggin Panic, who was the founder of Rick and Hennick, said, do you want to come on tour with us? And a month later, I was on tour with Nana and the rest of the band, and that's how I started singing.

Do you know what I felt from what you just said? Again, it was an era where nowadays, I think, everything is kind of so calculated. Everybody's got their band. They wouldn't really want to share that with somebody. No, they would never go, get up on the stage. Yeah, no. And sometimes, I guess it's what I've missed

not doing so much live television is when the anarchy can happen. Yes. And you go off script and you run over there and something happens. And I just got to follow you. And I think that's punk. Yes, it is. Punk is, you think this is going to happen,

but we can make anything can happen. It's the moment, the frisson, the ill, electricity of the moment, the energy of the moment is what drives what's happening in front of your eyes, whether it's TV or on a stage or in a play or whatever it is, you go with what feels right in that second and in that moment. And that's a brilliant recipe for life, in my opinion. That's why I like live TV. I love live TV. You love it, don't you? Yeah, lots of people don't like it. Yeah, I love it. Because they don't like the uncertainty. I love that. Yeah, but that's because we're from our era. That's because we're from what we're from.

Yeah. So that's how I started singing. But what, I mean, Andy, the reason why I would like you were top tier begin again guest is because you've just done it so many times. Like the singing, you know, that you kind of got dragged onto a stage and then you're in a band and you're going on tour. But the funniest thing for me was hearing that you didn't really think about it in terms of music industry or career or anything like that.

It was just a release. It was more like. I like these people. Yes. I'm going to do this with these people. That was kind of why it was happening. It was like just because we all needed to be together and do this thing together. And had the most incredible time.

I mean, what a way to spend your young life, basically, with your mates on the road, performing these wild gigs that were different every single night. The first gig I ever played, actually, was at the venue again. It was in the same place. And I wore my mum's bedroom curtains. it was a good curtain it was a really good curtain it was like maroon

I saw a picture then I thought is that the curtain it was like a dark maroon burgundy and it was like damask so it had sort of gold inlay and it was the fancy thing I could see I thought

I'm going to wear that and I just wrapped it around myself and tied it and pinned it with a giant pin in the back but I'm telling you I knew you then it would have looked amazing it looked great right it was it looked

Great. It was a look. People like, what do you mean? A cur? And I'm like, yeah, yeah. So that was the first thing. I mean, I just used to wear it's a fabric wrapped around us all the time. I mean, that's kind of how we dress, like notted here and there and on our heads and anywhere else, basically. I mean, again, punk. Punk. Not doing what you're going to wear that thing up there and pass it to me. Not conforming. Yeah, carrot bag. I had a carrot bag. I had a carrot bag dress once. That was a good dress.

What do you mean the carrot bag? It was like a bag that carrots came in. You know those mesh bags. And I just cut the corners off and put a hole in the neck and it was fabulous. Amazing. You'd have loved it. Quite see-through. Very mean. Totally net dress.

Amazing. You'd have loved it, mate. A little short, just about covered the bum and wore that with like winkle pickers. It was a look. I mean, this is what I love. It's just like always thinking, moving. And I think that that actually has served as a really strong bedrock. for life actually.

So that in fact, when big change happens, when things are, you know, feel like they're perhaps being thrust upon you, it doesn't really, I mean, there have been times where I've been, you know, scared and worried. But a lot of the time I'm like, hmm. So what you do, you have to kind of almost take a deep breath and find a calm centre in yourself

and work out which way you want to turn. It can be the moment of opportunity. I don't know if it's in Mandarin, in one A Chinese language crisis and opportunity are the same word. Wow. It's cool, that isn't it? It's very cool. It's very cool because the thing that you think is going to be the worst possible thing, the thing that's terrifying me because it means you have to deviate from your plan,

can sometimes mean that you let in whole brand new thoughts and ideas and people and situations that you would never normally have considered. and what you can consider is not always enough or the right thing because you don't really know what the possibilities are yet. So I think being open to that crisis moments is actually being open to exciting, unimaginable change. And that's kind of the change you want is what is unimaginable. That's what excites me about being alive.

It's like all the stuff I can't even possibly contemplate yet because I don't even know of what it is. That's what I want. I mean, I'm just really looking forward to the next beginning again. Like I, I, you're like a shapeshifter. It's just so exciting to see what you're going to do next. And that you're open to it. I'm excited because I'm going to introduce you to my new show sponsor.

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All in one word. I do want to talk to you very quickly about... Obviously, Sean's back in your life at this point. You're in London. And I want to talk to you about sickle cell because Sean had sickle cell and if you could just explain what that is. So sickle cell is a blood disorder.

And it means that you're... Now let me get this the right way around. I think it's the red blood cells. I get this mixed up. See the red or the white blood cells. It are constantly changing. And what happens when you have sickle cell is that instead of them changing shape

and just sort of being able to move around each other, they sickle. And they get locked in in different parts. of your body. And that can happen in your joints. It can happen in your head. It can happen in your spleen. It can happen anywhere. And when it happens, it's incredibly like unbearably painful, like beyond pain. And it's called a crisis. And sickle cell happens in people from the African diaspora. There's a version of it called fallasemia that happens to people who are of kind of Greek and Turkish, I think it's 11th, background, heritage.

And Sean was a sickle cell sufferer. I'm a carrier, which means I could pass it on to a child. Well, I'm not anymore, I couldn't because I don't have a wound, but when I was of childbearing years, a child of mine could have had it if I had a baby with another sickle cell carrier. So I think it's kind of stopped with me, actually, which is I'm really glad about. Did you see Sean having a tax when he was younger? All the time.

How often? Every couple of months at least. What would bring it on? Exertion, over-exertion brings it on. Now, over-exertion can, he was quite lucky, because over-exertion for some people can mean getting out of bed. So some sickle cell people cannot get out bed because walking across the room brings on a crisis

and it's so painful that they have to get back into bed. So they have to be in a wheelchair or, they can't because they just can't they're pushing their body it's like they just can't so and then their eyes go very yellow like almost jaundiced and uh it's just painful and Sean would get massive nosebleeds I would have to sit with him and the whole bucket under his face and it would just be pouring pouring out and I'd hold ice here on the bridge of his nose to try and stem the bleeding he used to be stuck in bed before you had tellies in every room he'd be stuck in bed upstairs and I'd be downstairs and he'd bang on the floor so I'd go up and see what he wanted

or I'd sit with him a bit and read to him a bit but I used to get quite impatient about it as well and almost some oddly you know like jealous because he'd get lots of attention and so we would fight about it as well you know after he died

I felt so awful about all that stuff and then I had to forgive myself because I was just a kid you know it's it was very tricky and then when he was about so he was 18 months older than me when he was about 12 or 13 we found out that he had

a expected lifespan of 30 and we had all these pamphlets about it because you know how we found out he had sickle cell so we were in Cyprus and he had a sickle cell crisis and they thought he had appendicitis

I think we were synestiphyrus yeah And the doctors thought he had appendicit. So they rushed him in to have an appendectomy. Now, when somebody has sickle cell, you can't give them general anaesthetic because it can kill them. Because the application of general anaesthetic affects the blood cells and it can bring on such a huge crisis. And they nearly, they were about to give him anesthetic. And the doctor suddenly went, hang on a minute, stop. And luckily, the doctor was a white doctor, had worked in Africa for years.

and he suddenly went, I'm not sure this is appendicitis. And Gayshan in the examination, I said, this boy's got sickle cell. So when he was about 11... That's the universe, isn't it? Yeah. What were the chances of that? Yeah, what were the chances of that?

So that's how we found out he had sickle cell. Wow. It's funny, things get a bit jumbled up in my head. I'm like, was that in Cyprus or was it when you came back? Do you get that? I think, yes. I can play things on that. And then I think, oh, that is normal at our age.

Yeah. I think it's okay. We're allowed. Yeah. Well, I mean. It is. It is what it is. I feel like remembering Sean,

I remember him being the most laid back, chilled out, relaxed, calm. And I wonder now you telling me that exertion brought on, whether years of knowing that if I get over-excited or I do, But it made him completely unique. Yeah, yeah. This level of chill. Chill was so attractive to me that over-enthusest. Fast brain.

Yeah, I mean, so smart. His brain was really, really, really, really fast, but he was very chill. And also, I'm his sister. So he was the opposite of me, like physically, energetically. So I would do all the energy stuff. And he would sort of direct me from the sofa. He would get me to do the most unbelievable shit record. And I was always like, but what?

You know, I was quite neurotic. What if we get in trouble? And he'd go, yeah, but we'll still have done it. Just fucking go and get the thing. Get the wine, Nick Dad's wine, you know. Terrible, like, naughty. He was so naughty. He was naughty, but in a really good way.

A really unbelievably charismatic way. I also just want to say, I don't know if it's possible on the YouTube channel. that we're going to put this on. But at this point, I would love to put a really beautiful picture of Sean Oliver, please, so everybody can see the beauty. Sean, because, no, really, Andy,

he was breathtakingly beautiful. But, like, his energy matched his beauty. Yes. Like, it was just, he was incredible. He was incredible. I mean, the reason I've got my look at my face is because I'm just remembering how annoyed I to get because he used to sleep with everybody.

I just want to let you know. I never had sex with Sean. You literally one of the only people I know. I did happen to be sleeping with his best friend though. That would have been bad. May not have stopped him. Just going to say. Just going to say, okay, just going to say.

But he did very much love for you so it probably would have stopped him. But he was unbelievable. I mean, I would get friends and I'd go, please, can you not? Just, can you just not? And he'd go and he actually said to me, once. I can't promise it. And I was like, I hate you! And then of course he slept with her.

Just to sleep with everybody. And I could tell when he slept with people. Oh, no. Because then they'd talk to him, they'd go, hi. And I'd think, oh, God, you shagged him, aren't you? You still really piss me off. And also, my dad was a terrible philanderer, so my dad was always sleeping with people. Right.

And I was like, oh, my God, I hate me both. You just keep it in your pants by five minutes. God's sake, you have to keep sleeping with everything with a pulse. It was like a thing. Well, it was an addiction of sorts, isn't it? It's feeding a beast. Feeding a desire. And, you know, with Sean, I just think he wanted to eat up as much life as he possibly could,

whether it was just sex with music, with everything. You know, he just had this. It's interesting because he was, as you say, incredibly chilled out about everything. He just didn't have those kind of trigger points that a lot of people do. He just didn't have them. but he had an urgency about living. But was that, was he aware of his life expectancy? Yes. Okay.

From the age of about 12, he knew that. Wow. Because that's really going to affect. Yeah, it's massive. But in a way also I think that we couldn't really conceive of what it meant. No. Because 30 seems so far away. Yes.

When you're 12. 30 is like some far off land, you know. But we knew it was that. It was young, but it was still hard for us to get ahead to run. And when he died, he was 27. Can you tell me a bit about that night? Oh, worse like my life, Davina. I was at the Globe, which was a sort of dive bar in a terrace.

No, what square is it? It was at the bottom of Powis Terrace, which is where I lived. And it was a little dive bar place that we all used to run and run around in. and it was the first place I ever cooked food and people paid me was in the globe. Remember when I used to do all the food? Yeah, I do. And there was a party in upstead.

Carmen Monroe, who is the black English actress, Caribbean English actress, was in there. And I love Carmen Ray. She was in there. And every time I see her face, it reminds me of that night now. And I was in the kitchen and the phone rang. Remember nobody had mobiles then.

It was 35 years ago. Nobody had mobiles. The phone in the globe rang. and it was somebody calling me from the hospital. I still don't know who it was, actually. I don't know who called me. I can't remember. I just remember a voice that you've got to come to the hospital now.

Sean's sick. And I got in a cab. I don't know who was with me. I actually, I remember the phone ringing. And from the phone ringing to after Sean's funeral, it's all a very weird, surreal. hard to place, hard to put my finger on thing. This nebulous way thing.

I remember odd bits of it at funny times. And I went to the hospital and Sam was there. Sam Robinson, his girlfriend who they were engaged to be married, he loved her so deeply. Like Sam was the tamer. She was the lion tamer, you know. He just adored her. And Sam was there.

I think Hussein was there who was. our friend, dear friend and manager, Sean's manager. I can't remember who else was there. Maybe Miranda was there actually as well, Sam's sister. Miranda might have been there. There were a few people there anyway, and he'd had a sort of stroke. And we were all out in the waiting area, and the doctors came back through,

and as soon as they walked through, I knew, and they went to Sam, because she was his, girlfriend, I think, and sort of sat down in front of him and said, he's just had a, what do they call it, basically it had a heart attack and a stroke simultaneously and it killed him. Because he was having a sick or cell crisis and the whole thing was just too much of his body, the whole thing overloaded and it killed him. And I ran past them and he was in the bed. No, I'd already seen him because I said to him, I spoke to him and I said, you'll be home in a couple of days.

When you get home, I'll make you some soup. And he was conscious. And then he went back out. And we went back out again. And he was weak. I remember that he was weak. And he just, because he was like, because he didn't want to be there.

He hated it there. And he was like, when can I come home? And I was like, you'll be home in a couple of days and I'll come and I'll make you some soup. And he was like, all right, fine. And then they came in space that he said, he told us he died. And I went, ran back in. And I grabbed him. And I could tell you.

He wasn't in there. He'd gone, he'd left. And he was cold. Body wasn't, it just wasn't, he didn't have the vitality, he didn't have the soul spark in it anymore. And my mum was on the way. She didn't get there in time. And I stood in the car park waiting for her to come.

And I couldn't call her and tell her. There was no phone, you know, so I just stood in the car while I waited for my mum to come. And she'd go out of a car, and she was just so hopeful. And I said, she's gone, Mum. She just crumpled. It was the worst moment of my life. I've got tissues that I've taken all out already. And I'm happy to tell her that he had gotten, you know, it was just a face.

I'm never thinking of a face. And you know, it nearly broke us, DeVina. It nearly broke you. It nearly broke all of us. Because he was such an extraordinary. You know, death does that to people, obviously. But Sean was a special person. And I saw everybody feels that about the person in Osprey.

But he really was a special person. Do you know what, Andy? I've been thinking about him a lot, obviously, because I knew I was going to talk to you today. And I thought that how lovely for Sean that it's 35 years, right? Yeah. 35 years later, we're still feeling the hole that Sean left. Yeah.

And I was in bed with Bruce. The phone rang. I picked it up. It was Nana. Oh, God. And I put the phone down. And I thought, I've got to wake you. you up and tell you and give you the worst news of your life that your best friend since you

I don't know how old they were teenagers too yeah kids has gone and I was like I don't want to wake you up like to change his life ever yeah and but but the beautiful thing out of that yeah is that he made in his very short short life 27 years yeah A massive impact. You know, on his gravestone, it says, he who burns twice as bright, burns half as long. And there's a shooting star on his gravestone.

And it's never truer, never a truer word was spoken. And when it relates to my brother. And I, you know, the further away I get from it, the more grateful I am that I had him at all. Yes. And the further way I get from it, I understand that life is what happens to you when you're here.

And what you do with that period of time. Some people live till they're 95 and don't make any impact at all. There's a sadness to that, deep sadness. And I think of Sean's funeral. Remember the funeral? There were people that you couldn't get into the crematorium. There were people, it was a sunny day. It was like the royal death that happened on Nabok Road.

The whole place went still. The house came up the road. It was amazing. lined on the streets and all around the outside of the crematorium there's like banks and there were like people four deep on the banks outside the crematorium and that's a testament to my brother and what he did with the time that he had here and that's a beautiful powerful thing and his children are incredible his grandchildren are extraordinary and i get to have them and be them and i get to be his sister forever you know that's the other thing i'm like so proud that that was my brother and that I got to have that with him that we got to tour the world we got to be in this incredible band together

and do all this extraordinary things in this really short space of time you know so I there's as an older person I have so much gratitude for having him at all and I remember I don't know if I've told you this before I think I might have told you when you and Sarah came to do staring up

with me in Makita Margie Klai Kla Yes, as an actress. She was in that film years ago, something about, Letter to Brezhne if it was called. She was the lead, and it's a brilliant Libra Pollyan actor, just fantastic woman. And I met her after Shawna died. I was with Viv Goldman walking up Port Vila Road. And there was a big bus there and Margie was filming. And Margie brought us onto the bus and Viv said, oh, this is Andy. And I was, you know, she was explaining to Margie why I kept bursting into tears and Margie said Andy's brother died a few weeks ago. And it was literally a couple of a couple of weeks later and uh margie sat down and she took my hands and she said i lost my brother 23 years ago and i was like like it was like it was like water to a dying woman i'm hearing these words because i looked at her and i knew she understood and she said you'll it'll never go away but you'll find somewhere to keep it she said people will say lots of things to you and you probably swap them all to fuck off and i said sure and i said sure and

And she said, this is all I can give you. And it was the greatest gift anybody could ever give me. And it's turned out to be absolutely true. It's never gone away, but I find somewhere. I've found a little quiet place within. And that's where it lives. The pain of it. And every now and again, it comes up like just now.

And it feels very recent and real and all over again. I mean, we were discussing before we started how mad it is that the last time I saw you, because life is just so mad, isn't it? Yeah, we have to tell us. I was on your podcast, stirring it up, and it was a year ago. To this week. And we realised then, oh my God, it's actually the anniversary of your brother dying this week. And we've done it again.

And we've done it again this week. Without knowing or realising. We just realized at the car. Yeah, last night, a lady in bed, I went, hang on, what day is it? It's very cool. I was like, my God, we've done it again. So this weekend, it will be 35 years since you'll die. Mad.

Absolutely. So that to me, see, I feel like it's him though. They are stardust. The people we lose are stardust and they live in us. They live all around us. I believe this really firmly. We've both lost enough people at this point in our lives. You know, I'm not a religious person, but I do have a spiritual sense of the world that I cling to.

Sometimes like it's a lifeboat, you know, that sense of that which we cannot. put our fingers on, that which is intangible. And that's what, again, coming back to these things about books and music, those are the things that books and music help me to connect to is the stuff that we cannot imagine, the stuff that's bigger than us, that's greater than us, that is outside of our control.

There's nothing to do with what we decide and what we choose. It just is, you know. And after, I think, any great loss in your own, life connecting to that is the thing that keeps you alive and keeps you going and keeps you inside your own body because somehow grief makes you leave your own body you kind of float above yourself like you know there was a it took a good couple of years before and re-entered my body after sean died I was like hovering above for quite a long time I felt when my sister died I felt like the whole

world just stopped spinning and I'd go places and I'd think oh the world's still spinning for you like I can't move forwards yeah and I'm literally stuck. Which they're meant to do. Yeah, which everybody's meant to do. But it was quite hard to explain that to somebody. Yeah. I always try to remember to check in.

Yes. With people who've lost someone because it is a weird. It's after the funeral. Everybody goes back to getting on with their lives. Oh, you're fine now. Just sit in there. It's a bit like having a baby actually is the same thing. Like after the baby comes.

It's interesting because it's birth and death. So birth and death. after the baby comes, this monumental thing happens in your life that changes you forever. And everybody else is like really interested, oh, lovely, or I'll pour you, that's a terrible nightmare. And then they have to get on with their own lives. So it's just normal. But then you're sitting there going, oh, my God, now I've got a baby. What happens next?

You know, or, oh, my God, I've lost somebody. How am I supposed to carry on? And you find a way. But it did hit you hard. It hit me hard. It hit me hard. It nearly broke me. Because it, it's.

it developed into the trauma basically became an eating disorder. What happened to be a eating disorder where I could not stop eating. And it actually connected to the feelings that we were talking about the beginning of this when I was talking about when racism first hit me

and where it lived in me in that I innately felt like I was wrong and disgusting. And the pain of losing Sean turned into me compulsively eating. I could not stop. Like in the dark, eating anything, not, you know,

making something delicious and sitting down having a snack, literally eating anything I get my hands on. And crying, rocking in the dark, wanting to be sick, not knowing how to stop. I mean, it was just the most terrifying downward spiral.

And also revolting. I've revolted myself. And I did. didn't know how to tell anybody what was happening. Couldn't talk about it because I was so ashamed. The shame of it was crippling to being alike. Absolutely awful. So I would do it in the dark because I was even ashamed to see myself,

let alone let anybody else know what was happening. And I mean, I don't still, to this day, like the, you know, we're talking about the things that we kind of control that we don't see. the universe absolutely brought the right people to me just when I was going under. I really was. And I met a girl, woman called Sarah, who had just come out of rehab for heroin addiction. And she was talking to me about her heroin addiction. I was thinking, it sounds really familiar.

The feelings are the same, right? Yeah, yeah. She was going on, I couldn't stop, and I was degrading myself. And she'd done some terrible things, and shame of it. And I was thinking, I still didn't tell. I was just sitting there. Didn't you? No, and I still didn't do that.

And I was sitting there thinking, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. And then I said, really quietly, I said, wish you could do that for food. She said, what do you mean? And I said, well, you know, she said, no, tell me what you mean. And I said, well, I was making me chuck up again. I was like, I don't know how to stop. I mean, really, too, really scared. I was so scared, Mina.

And she said, you can. And I said, what? She said, it's a thing. You have an eating disorder. And I'd never heard the words, eating disorder. I just thought I was disgusting. So awful. And she took me to see a doctor called Dr. Robert Lefevre,

who used to run a clinic called Promise. He said, tell me what's been happening. And I told him when he said, you've got a compulsive eating. disorder and I said I'm ill. He was like you're ill. It was like the biggest relief. I just thought I was

disgusting monster basically and he said right I want to go to see your doctor he gave me a letter I knew this today was going to be like this by now so it's going to be a lot crying to be and I just going to get it all out of me

and he gave me a letter to see my doctor and I took it to my doctor and the doctor said are you anorexic? And I said no you said are you making this or sick that you're bulimic I said no and he went we can't you can't go and I was terrified again

so he was saying you could go to treatment if you get approval from but not from me he said we're going to put you on a diet and I'm saying that's not going to help I'm trying to be on diet because every day I would wake up and think right I'm not going to eat today

that was my solution and then obviously I'd crack and then once I'd eaten one thing I couldn't stop so I would spend days locked in the house because I didn't know when anyone to see me and I was getting fat and fat and bigger and bigger and my body felt literally like it belonged to somebody else more

and more. And then I went back to Dr. Lefeva and I said they said the NHS can't afford it and he said well I'm going to send you anyway and I said I haven't got the money and he said you don't have to pay me and he let me go for like two and a half

months he sent me into residential care and that man saves my life I've said it before that he literally saved my life because I think I would have, I was definitely having suicidal ideation. I was having very dark thoughts because I didn't know.

I was just, how long was this after Shawna died? I think it crept up on me and it sort of gradually, gradually, gradually, got worse and worse, but I suppose probably within the year. And it was a trigger basically for a lot of other things as well. It triggered all of the feelings of self-loathing from being a child. And it all coalesced into this snowball,

this absolute snowstorm of self-revulsion and self-rejection and painful, slow self-destruction. were you scared of getting better? I didn't really know what getting better meant. And I was scared of letting go of food. Yeah, that's kind of what I meant. Yes, yes, yes. I was scared of what a world looked like

without having those things to fall back on, having that to fall back on. I mean, there was alcohol and there were drugs around that as well, but those things have never been an issue to me. I could pick them up, put them down, take them or leave them. But it was always the distorted relationship with food that had the capacity to become really, really bad. And it's weird because it's also my art.

But I was going to say that. So you went to treatment and he did help you. Oh, I mean, it saved my life. It completely changed my life. How did that happen? What happened was in treatment, I was given, I understood what had happened to me previously. right like for the first time ever

I've met a therapist and I had never spoken to a therapist and a psychotherapist getting mixed up with types of therapists I think she's psychotherapist and she said to me well I'm not surprised you're angry and I was like I'm gonna have to be angry she went of course you got angry and you know she said

you told me your life story I understand that the racism you dealt with the how you internalized it the rejection that you felt socially all the different things you dealt with of course you're learning that in on yourself. It's absolutely normal. And I was like, what? This was completely revelatory to me. I'd never heard these ideas, heard these thoughts, heard these ideas. So I was like, right. And especially

for a woman. Yes. And I was like, right, so the fury that I feel every single day that I turn in on myself is healthy to feel, but I shouldn't be turning it in on myself. And I have to find a language for it. So they taught me, they gave me tools to express my feelings and my emotions and to navigate the world. And I'd never really had those tools before. I didn't know how to say this is what I feel like. This is what I don't want. This is how to draw, you know, to draw boundaries for myself, to choose things for myself. I always felt that life was heartening towards me at a great speed and I was trying to not die.

Perhaps when it felt like I was just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, like, you know, sort of ducking and diving, trying not to get knocked out by the next cataclysmic massive thing that was hurling itself hurtling towards me. So suddenly I was given control of the reins to my own life and I could stop the horses when I wanted to get off the carriage, have a sip of water, get back on and have a little trot. I was like, oh my God, this is incredible. It was revelatory to me.

You know, people are often, when I talk to people now, they say God you're so brave emotionally I'm like I have to be because I know what happens when I'm not I have to say no to you and I have to tell you what I'm feeling like in this moment because if I don't it turns in on me

and I know what happens when it turns in on me I get really ill and then I start damaging myself and I'm not prepared to do that I don't want to live like that and so because I don't want to live like that I am very emotionally honest because that's healthy

That's what healthy looks like to me. I think what's fascinating is that the thing that was killing you was, like you said, your art. Like it was the thing that gives you also the greatest joy. So how do you... I love to cook. How do you can... I mean, that seems like so hard. It would be a bit like the thing you love for me,

the thing that I love doing would be doing something artistic with heroin. But I have to stop. But I don't know how I would... I think it's because the thing with cooking and the thing with food, it has many faces. Heroin doesn't really have many faces. I mean, that was a stupid thing to say because obviously you got, but I'm trying to say I was addicted to that. But I've had this conversation with quite a lot of other addict addict addicts. Addictive people.

I'm going to say addicts. I've had this conversation and I think it's a valid point. I think it's a really interesting point. And the conclusion I've come to because it is like having a little bit of the thing all the time that actually try to kill you or that you try to kill yourself. with is that food has this other face and that face is a nurturing, beautiful, nourishing face. Heroin doesn't have that. No. Neither does alcohol.

No. Neither does alcohol. No. Neither does whatever other drugs. They don't have another side of them. Food has another side of it and the other side of that face is a beautiful, powerful, unifying, wonderful, like, life-giving force. So you can take that thing and walk to the other side of the river.

And on the other side, on the other riverbank is beauty and nourishment and joy and life. And that's what I've done. I've crossed the river to the other side. And I think that's what the place that food held for me before, it became dark and twisty and weird and horrible. You know, when I grew up, cooking was a beautiful thing for me. I learned to cook when I was really, really young and I would cook at home on a Sunday and listen to like Sam Cook. And, you know, my dad used to be not bipolar on a Sunday or something. I don't know.

Sundays were something that he made him really happy. He would have a beautiful singing voice, my dad. Did he? He was all around the house singing Sam Kirk and Otis Reddy. So he was musical. Yeah, yeah. A lot of my family are, but actually from my mum's side. Wow.

My uncle's a jazz, a guitar player. Wow. Yeah, yeah. There are loads of people played piano, saxophones, singers, writers. You know, the Caney Masons are my cousins, those classical musical music. They're my cousins, you know, their dad's a piano player. So music does run in our family. I also feel like when I when I was hanging out with you before Sean died

food was always part you know it was always on the menu like it was coming around and Nana would be cooking very social very social very connecting and very I think for me help me understand my heritage my culture who I am food to me is a window it's a portal into self-understanding you know what we cook how we cook why we cook it how we cook it these ingredients end up on the plate. Learning to put good things into your body, learning to love your body, you have to understand food

and you have to love food, I think. I mean, going from a suicidal ideation when you were in that really dark place and then going to treatment after that, while you're in treatment, did you think, okay, this is where I want to go? Or did you leave and just go, step out,

go, right, who am I? like the epitome again of beginning again again I think I've stepped out and said right who am I because they were a bit like the one thing about you're an alcoholic and you're doing really not you know I don't really care about alcohol I can put it down I barely think these days I'll have a drink sometimes but it's never driven my life in that kind of way

so I had to kind of work out for myself the bits to keep yes that made sense for me do you know what I mean and I think that's true for lots of people but I had to get out come out and work out who I was and it took a while to kind of rebalance myself but pivoting it always felt quite natural to me

to just start the next thing again and I think I after that I was working at the lighthouse for a bit at the London lighthouse which was just off Labrard Grove and it was an AIDS HIV AIDS hospice and I started volunteering there

I used to do the women's day on a Friday, Women's and Family Day a Friday. We just used to sing songs and hang out and just do nice things. So it's like a sort of just giving support emotionally and socially to people who were dealing with HIV and AIDS. And when I was working, and that place was brilliant, God, it was amazing. I don't think it's there anymore. Why? Why was it pretty? It gave me perspective on life. Yeah. You know, there were people dealing with their own mortality, people with young children think, you know, understand that they weren't going to live to see their children grow older because it's back when medication

wasn't as it is now or, you know, dealing with that they may not grow up to see that with their children. People dealing with immediate sickness and, you know, faced with their own mortality still living these full, brave, brilliant lives, you know, and I realized that I was not ready to give up and I was not ready to go under and that there were ways through, you know, having come out of treatment, I had all these new tools and I was working there. And somebody there said to me one day, uh, they worked at GLR, which was Great in London radio, which was the BBC local radio in London. And they said, do you want to do a show at GLR? And I was like, what's that? And they said, you want to do a radio show, Sunday nights, do you want to come do it? And I said, yeah, right, I didn't

really know what it meant. Again, I had no idea what they meant. And I went and I met the head of GLR and we sort of had a chat and she went, you'll be great. Do you want to do it? And I said, sure, that Sunday I started doing a live radio show. But I bet you were an absolute natural. Yeah, I loved it. And they knew you were going to be. How do it? What button that one? Sure. I just was like driving the thing. And I was just playing tunes and interviewing people would come along different music, you know, artists. I think the first interview I did was with Lana, of course. And I had to keep remembering it wasn't just stuff in the kitchen.

I feel a bit like that now, to be fair. You have to remember the other people listening. I've got to ask questions, hold on. Yeah. And but it was wonderful and it gave me a real basis and a love for broadcasting. I suddenly thought, I really like this. I love doing this, actually, because it was another string to my bow and another facet. I feel like you're the same, De Beiner, in that.

they're all sort of transferable skill sets. The thing that's always made you brilliant, you know, when you were running London clubs and the club scene doing it in the way, beautiful way you did, was because you're an incredibly natural communicator, you know, and that's what makes you a really good interview, and it makes you a really good broadcast,

and it makes you good at the things that you do. The same things that made me a good performer. You sing, you know, great singing. All of those things, it's a kind of movable feast. You can apply it in many different ways. You can apply it to writing, you can apply it to broadcasting, you apply it to singing. I can apply the same thing in the kitchen. I did a dinner the other night with a chef called Apie Shashadara at a place called Pally Hill in Mayfair.

We were on the past. I was thinking, this is like an amazing gig. I haven't been on the past for ages. I was loving it. Food was coming out. Room full of people, beautiful lights. The food looked gorgeous. We did an Indo-Carib kind of beautiful marriage of dishes.

And we'd written all these new recipes together. the teams were back behind us. It was just fabulous, you know, and I thought, this is the feeling I get when I'm on stage. It's the same, it comes from the same truth, the same heart, I think. And to do it right, these things should come from the same heart, I think. And so after GLR, how did you get back into food? I think me and Nana had just been cooking at home doing a few things,

and I met a brilliant woman called Sam Richards, who was my first sort of agent. And I did a couple of other things. And then she said, I think you and Nana should do a cooking show. And I was like, oh. And then it was like, really? And we went and talked to the BBC a bit. And they were like, you do it. So they gave us the opportunity to do this show.

Andy and Nan, no, what was it called? Nana and Andy dish it up. And we did one series of it. We had a ball. We had the most incredible time. Just us cooking art. And it was quite funny for us, of course, because obviously neither of us are trained in any way whatsoever.

That's what's so great. Yeah. And we had to try and understand how to communicate our recipes to other people. Because we, you know, we quit a bit like, pass me that thing. Throw a bit in there. Do a bit in there. Yeah, a bit more, bit more. Yeah, stop.

That's how we always cooked, you know. So to try and actually quantify that for other people. That's something of the challenge. So we did that. And then after we did that series, I started doing sort of supper clubs. And it became more of an expression of, my artistic desire to communicate with other people.

That's kind of how I see being in the kitchen and how I see cooking really. It's like a, it's an expression of the same things that I was expressing when I was writing songs and performing. It's like the things that there aren't always words for the bits of me that I don't always talk about. The quieter, more still things

that you also want to share with another person without necessarily having to tell them about it. You know, you give somebody something that you've made for them. That's an expression of love without having to whang on about it. You know, it's like a quiet gift from one heart to another. So do I. I love to cook. Cooking is a joyful, but it's beyond that.

It's a kind of, it kind of makes me tingle. and it makes me like the other day when I did the thing with Abby that I was talking about, the dinner that I was just talking about I had tears in my eyes because it made me so happy like the faces of the people in the restaurant was so like they were flushed

with like the happiness of food and I could see them savoring every bite and the things that we had created was affecting them physically and emotionally and spiritually and that it's like It's the best thing in the world to know that you've been felt, you've been heard. I wonder whether culturally you being Antiguan, like it's in your blood.

And I quickly want to talk about because one of the weirdest things, one of the maddest things for me ever was I remember waking up in my bed. I think I was living in Chiswick. I turn on the telly and Makita's on the telly. And I'm like, what? But that's, hang on a minute. What? What is going on?

What? But so, Makita carves an amazing career out for herself. And I loved, you know, Makita was kind of really full of great spirit and energy and fun. But has like just developed into the just most amazing adult. I've watched her grow up on television. Yeah. It's been beautiful. But you two coming together to work together with food and culture at the heart of it is one of the most moving things.

And I'm pretty sure it's not just because I love you both. I'm pretty sure it's because there's something magic that happens. Can we just talk about the I player trip? By the way, BBC, if you're watching, you put it back on the I player and keep it there. Stop taking it off and putting it back on again. It's not okay because the world needs it. And I keep wanting to tell people about it and saying you should go and watch it. We can't find it anywhere.

I know it's quite frustrating that because you're talking about the Caribbean. Yes. So the Caribbean and in Makita in the Caribbean was to me one of the things I'm most proud of in my whole life. It was quite an extraordinary trip that we did together. We went to Antigua, Barbuda and Barbados. And when you just explain, how old was Makita at this point? I guess it was about, what is, she's 40 now. So she was probably 37, seven.

And she'd never... She'd been to Antigua, but she went to Antigua when she was 12 or 13. Our friend Amanda, you know, Amanda Meading, took us to Antigua as a birthday present for Mikita. He was such a gorgeous, generous, amazing. Rented a house, flew us out there, me, her, Charlie. Condu and the girls went on this incredible holiday to Antigua

and Wachita spent half of it on the beach like Gloria Swanson in a bloody every gal with a towel around her going oh it's so hot oh God we're going to the ocean again oh my god you know like nightmare teenager basically and I wanted her to have this like spiritual amazing and she just would not

stubborn refused just a teenager would be with their mates you know whatever and which is fine But I was really upset about it. At the time I was like, oh my God, you're so annoying. Anyway, so we got to go back. And I was like, I really want her to feel it this time. And boy, did she read it.

Watching Makita, like, during that series was one of the most moving things I've ever seen. I sobbed the whole way through. But for you too, to share that with your child when it's been really important to you. but to watch the penny drop. Yeah. And her blackness, her Antiguan heritage. Yeah. Her Caribbean nature.

And there were so many things about herself, she was like, oh, that's really, I'm like, yeah, because are you black. You know what I mean? It was really like her understanding fully how her heritage resides within her. The other thing I thought that really was profound for me to hear was that being mixed race or mixed heritage means that, you know, she'd kind of had one foot in one world, one foot in the other, but that at school she'd kind of wish like, oh, I just want to be white.

Yeah, because it seemed easier. When she said that, I was like, wow. Yeah. And for you to kind of sense that in your child. It's really heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking. Heartbreaking because it's like being, like, really what they were doing is throwing you away, you know. But to be with her, while she's experiencing this wake-up.

Oh, it was beautiful. It was absolutely beautiful. And she'd already gone through some of it, I guess, before that. But it was like the deep soul penny really dropped. We felt it. And, you know, since, and it affected our relationship deeply. It affected our relationship to the Caribbean deeply. It's affected our relationship to the idea of being in Africa deeply.

How has it affected your relationship with Makita? I think that we, it's brought. us even closer together, traveling together and learning things, not just about our heritage, but ideas about, when you learn about yourself, it helps you learn about the world. The more you know about yourself, the more because people often say, well, what difference does it make? What's the point of it? The more you learn about yourself and where you come from, the more you understand the movement

of peoples, the more you understand migration, like voluntary or not, forced or not. I mean, culturally, I think, knowing exactly where you come from is incredible. valuable. I think one of the things that like makes you so attractive is your fire for life, for love

and you love with your whole heart. You are you give everything it's it's so attractive to be around. You are so attractive to be around.

And I guess like to to round up your life story, we've got to talk about this crazy stepping stone to like primetime TV. So I've seen Makita on TV. Because for me, you're, you know, fuck Jenny are from the block. You're Andy from the block. Like Jenny was never on the block. She wasn't on the block.

You were on the block. I was on the block. You were the block. But, and I just, I just was like, wait, how old were you when you got great British menu? 50, what is it now? What am I now? 60, so 54 or something? Can I just like, you know, like mega presenting major prime time TV show that everybody loves is absolutely massive.

at 54. This is what I love about you. You are a walking advert for like everything is possible. And you know, it's interesting. When I was really young, right? I used to say to people, I don't care about age.

It doesn't, you know, doesn't mean anything to me because I always have friends who are quite a lot older than me when I was really young. And I now have friends who are quite a lot younger than me. Me too.

I just have friends. I just always have friends. I don't care how old you? I just, if I like you, I like him. And when you're young, and you say that people believe you. When you're older and you say that people go, sure, sure.

Yeah, whatever. I think you're saying it because you just want to hang around with a bunch of young people. It's like, no, I just don't, it's just never really been of interest to me. What's interesting to me is the content of your character. I don't really give a shit about whether you're 24, if you're 64. I just want to know what's in your heart. That's all that really interested me in a about person. So I, I, no one was more surprised than me, Tereena, when all this stuff.

Were you? Well, sort of. Really? I wasn't. When I got a call, I got a call from grape dish menu. I was in working, running, we had a pub in the Homerton, perfectly happy, working, toiling away, 120 covers on a Sunday, you know, all of that. And, you know, writing my menus, going down the market, having a great time with myself. I was loving it, you know, cooking for people, making up new things, cooking like Garfield, my partner. We haven't talked about Garfield. We love Garfield. We love Garfield. We love Garfield. Garfield is great. It's great. How long have you guys been together? 30 years.

Can I just say big ups? 30 years. And he's been trying to marry you this entire time. He's been trying to marry this entire time. You're not having it. I might eventually have to marry him just for legal reasons. But also for the party. For the party for everybody else because people will not shut up about it.

Yeah. Oh my God, I'll lose my shit for you two get married. I think we might have to. Yeah, yeah. Because, well, just also legally. Yes. With one of the size. Yes, of course.

You know, all of that. stuff. Anyway, love you Garfield. Love you, Godfield. I do love you. I love him as well. I don't like the idea of marriage. That's okay. Anyway. Anyway. Anyway. I'm pootling around in the Jack and the Star in Homerton, you know, do-de-do-do-do-do-do. I get a phone call. Well, let me tell you this, you'll like this.

I was riding my bike two weeks before. It's to ride my bike around happening marshes for exercise. And I was riding my bike was thinking, something's happening. I feel really fucking fantastic. I was riding the bike and I came back and I'm bachie. Garfield were there and I went, something's happened. This is what I said, I don't know, but the stars are aligned. I'm telling you, there's been a fucking shift.

I can feel it. You know. Yeah. And they were like, okay, crazy. What are you having? I was like, just watch me. Two weeks later, I got a phone call going, will you come and have lunch with this brilliant guy called Tom,

who was the, he was executive producer for Great Beach, Manny. And I'd done one job with him months and, like two years before. And they gave, I did an audition for something. and then they gave it to that guy that makes pasta sauce he's got several names I can't remember his name Oh yes

He's to do master chef That dude Yes I remember him What his name is Not Lawrence de We're in the other one Lloyd Grossman Noid Groesman He doesn't have three names

Can I just say something I remember Well come I was like No yeah That dude And they gave it to him This judging thing

On some show That didn't last very long But anyway I had met Tom on that show and we've got on really, really well. Cut to, two years later, he's got, he's executive producer of Great British menu,

and he's like, we need Andy. So I call, they called me, and I said, oh, hi. And they said, will you come and have lunch with us? Will you come and be a guest judge? And I thought, it seems like a lot to be a guest judge. Why, they could buy me lunch anyway. I go and I sit down and they went, it's not guest judge.

Prue Leith is leaving. Will you, would you like to take her place? And I said, excuse me? Do you just offer me prelis job? I mean, I literally was peopling around in Hackney in the pub, you know? And they said, yeah, you want to do it? And I was like, yes.

I thought, I did think about it for a second. I was thinking, can I do that? I thought, of course you can. Yes. So then I went and I met the dude from the BBC and stuff. And we had to go on like an audition dinner. We went to a Jason Atherton restaurant and we had dinner. And they asked me what I thought about they did.

And I told them in detail what I thought about that. Amazing. Got seven, by the way, Jason. Fennel was raw. Don't like raw fennel. And we just. We did that. And then literally a week later, they offered me the job.

And I said yes. And then I was with Oliver, Peyton, who we both know. Oh, my God. It's so funny. So funny. I messaged him the other day. Did you? Yeah.

I love Oliver. Yeah, I love Oliver. I have to say, Matthew Ford and Oliver Payton when I got to Great Beach, many, were amazing. Really? It was so welcoming. Because it was a bit intimidating. Yeah, it's quite scary, right? It's a big show and it's very beloved.

Yes. And Prue is Prue. Yes. God damn me. Please. No one knew who the hell I was. Do you know what I mean? Some chick from the pub in Hamilton. I think you were quite well known. Not at that level. Not in the world of culinary excellence. I was quite well known for other things.

Somebody said to me the other day, you were the most famous person who wasn't famous that I knew for years. Do you know what I mean? Yes. I think maybe I felt like that about you like. So I was well known, but not famous. And certainly not for that, you know, particularly. for cooking but not for, you know, that kind of fine eye for detail and all that sort of stuff. So it was a little bit intimidating and they were just incredible. Did you?

It was just absolutely lovely, just so sweet and kind and made space for me. Yes. They didn't have to do it in that way. They could have just gone and been a little bit minty about the whole thing, you know what I mean? And they made real space for me and were like, well, what does what you think? What do you think about this dish? and why do you think that? And really, but just really elicited ideas.

Made you feel safe to me, made me feel safe enough to give them my honest thoughts of me and stuff. So very quickly, I felt very much at home. And then after two years of being a judge, they offered me. Amazing. They said, would you like to host it?

And I said, absolutely. And I'm really glad I did. Oh my God. I mean, Andy, it's like watching you, I've known you for so long. And watching your career has been one of the greatest joys of my life. But, you know, obviously you were a natural choice for this podcast because of all the times you've picked yourself up.

Yeah. You've dusted yourself off. Start all over again. And you've started all over again. And pivots and saying yes, even when you're scared. Yes. And all the learnings. Yes.

And I think that not allowing. allowing fear to be the thing that stops you from doing things is very important. You know what I mean? And I was like, do it, do it, do it, do it, even if it terrifies you, do it. And I think that has always been my go-to position, even if it terrifies you, do it. In fact, the more it terrifies you, possibly the more you should do it. I wonder having heard your story, whether that really terrified girl, who came back to Bury St Edmonds, who lived in abject terror every single day, was in training for you

doing everything that terrifies you. I think a bit... And that you got through it. Yeah. I think knowing that I could survive that. Yeah. Means I know that this two shall pass. And also, it's an opportunity.

Take the opportunity. Because you know what? It won't kill you. I might fall on my ass. It doesn't matter. You'll get back up again. You fall on your ass. You'll be a bit bruised.

Get some cocoa butter. to rub it in, have a cup of tea and get back up and get on with it. That's kind of how I think about it. It's like failing is not the worst thing in the world. Not reaching the thing that you think you wanted to reach. It's not the worst thing in the world. You know, when people talk about, someone said this to me, oh, I read something the other day about, you know, Apollo 13 or, you know, an inventor,

like they were inventing something. When they finally get to the prototype that works, they've had 200 before that didn't work. You don't just invent the vacuum cleaner overnight. You don't just invent a rocket ship overnight. Stuff has to fuck up quite royally. Things have to go wrong quite badly. But you keep going at it until you get it right. And then when you get it right, it's even more satisfying.

It's all right if you don't get it right. I think that's a really big lesson, actually. And that's something I would like to impart, actually. If there's one thing I want to say in this conversation, it's like it doesn't matter if it doesn't work out. You will get up again, have a little rest, have a cup of tea and then work out what you want to do next. It's okay. It's not the end of the world.

It doesn't really matter what other people think either, P.S. Because they don't, nobody knows who you are except you. No one can tell you who you are except yourself. No one can define you except yourself. And you're, you know, so other people's idea of your successful failure are not my business. Are they? No. they're not though

you all like that what other people think of me as none of my business is something that somebody taught me once and I was like that is absolutely true you know I want people to like me obviously I'm a human being

but they don't it's not the end of the world I'm getting worse and worse with that as I get older I'm like I where hearing is now I take them off at 7 o'clock so I'm done

I'm like I'll see you later bye bye um Andy Oliver I could have gone on for another four hours. This is the problem.

We'll have to come back for part two. I mean, we might have to. There's more to talk about. I think that life is good. Bide it in the ass. Do something that scares you every day, even if it's just a little bit. Even if it's just a tiny little bit.

That's what I think. And learn from every mistake. Yeah. There's a learning, isn't there? It's all right. And every big traumatic experience has learning. Yeah. Sometimes it takes a minute.

Yeah. To work. Yeah. Or years. Yes. But you'll get there. Yeah. Eventually you'll go.

Oh, right. Mm. Can we just give Andy Oliver a round of applause everybody. There's people out there. You forget, right? I mean, what is not to love about this woman? There's an energy to Andy that is so infectious and gorgeous to be around. But the way that she has navigated through life,

life in such a positive way, even when it has thrown, it's very worst at her. She has picked it up and turned it into a positive and dusted herself off and gone on. And for a woman to get to 54, 53, 54 and become a presenter of a prime time TV show, you know, having kind of dabbled in media before that, but really, huge job. I love everything about what Andy stands for, who she is as a person

and literally the glow that she has in her soul.