The Netmums Podcast - S8 Ep7: The Maths Factor with Carol Vorderman

Episode Date: November 1, 2022

Carol Vorderman is Wendy and Jen's special guest on the podcast this week, as she talks about the best way to get children excited about maths, the confidence that can bring, and how dyslexia can actually provide enormous potential for some kids. Carol also discusses her age defying outlook, her determination to one day do the splits, and clarifies what we've all been thinking for so long, that nobody ever really needs to know how to do quadratic equations!

This episode is sponsored by The Maths Factor, the online platform from learning company Pearson. This engaging educational platform, created by Carol Vorderman, helps your child master years one to seven maths topics. It's matched to the national curriculum, caters to all abilities, and helps reinforce the message that maths is the key to unlocking a lifetime love of learning and confidence. 90% of parents see an improvement in their child's confidence within three months of using the maths factor. Now on with the show. You're listening to the Netmums podcast with me, Wendy Gollage.

And me, Jennifer Howes. On this week's show. Who really needs to know the answers to quadratic equations? You don't. So I would always argue that there should be two GCSEs. But before all of that, hello everybody, welcome to another episode. Jen and I have been discussing this morning. Jen is wrapped up like she's in the bloody Arctic this morning because she's refusing to put her heating on. And I have caved, my husband's away, which might also be why I've caved, and put the heating on so it's really warm in here. I'm feeling like I might take a layer off and we decided that heating has become the new weather conversation in Britain this autumn winter. Have you put your heating on yet? So Jen, you haven't put your heating on yet. I haven't, I haven't. That's why I'm bundled up.

But our guest doesn't appear to be too cold, even though she's very cool. Oh, cha-ching. Get you. Our guest this week is none other than Carol Vorderman, MBE. Famed for co-hosting Countdown for 26 years, she is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, best-selling author, and a pilot. Carol is a champion of all things maths and as such has created The Maths Factor. Working with Pearson, the learning company, The Maths Factor website is designed to kickstart a love of maths and help children master years one to seven mathsics. So welcome, Carol. Thank you very much. It's lovely to

meet you. And I'm not sure if my heating's on or not, you know, I've been a great proponent of insulate, insulate, insulate all my life. And, you know, I'm so old, I've lived in various houses, and it's the first thing I do walls floors ceilings everywhere I can insert I do so I sort of live in this strange cocooned thing I'll forever open windows so right Carol you know what I'm going to ask you about my husband has more maths qualifications than I can count my 11 year old loves it and quite frankly maths scares me witless it's always been like my weak link talk to me about maths how can it how can the maths factor help kids like me who were just scared of maths oh actually I'm 44 and I'm still bloody scared of maths in truth it's

interesting that you say that because you know I have worked in this maths education field for a long long time and the maths factor has been running for 12 years that's my online school I've been writing and uh promoting maths books with Doreen Kindersley with DK for 25 30 years and obviously 40 years now, can you believe 40 years, November the 2nd, being on the telly talking about maths and actually doing it. So I think I have a pretty unique position because people have spoken to me about their, what's called maths phobia now, for a very long time. I wrote and chaired a report for David Cameron. I'm not a Tory, I'm not an anything. She said that very quickly, did you notice? I'm a pragmatic woman who, if the current Prime Minister, I did a lot of work with David Blunkett, for instance, about

online grooming of children, Labour Party. So I say that so that this is not politically motivated. But I spent two years of my life chairing this task force, which was looking into maths aged 5 to 19 across our education system. And to answer your question, the one thing that we found on a factual basis was that if a child gets maths phobia, and it's generally because they aren't taught very well, by the age of 11, it is very rare to resolve that. So the facts are 96% of primary school teachers gave up maths at the age of 16. And they gave up maths simply because either they weren't taught well, they found it difficult, they weren't particularly interested in the subject. So what happens is, and again, this is factual,

the SATS results, age 11, if you got above the government target at age 11 and then we could translate it to five years later when they took their GCSEs so this is all statistics which we did for the report so if you got above the government target by age 11 you would more or less be guaranteed to get your GCSE maths. If you achieve the government target, which then was level 4b, around about half would get their GCSE at age 16. But if you were below by the age of 11, almost all failed their GCSE. So secondary school may have added information, but it did not take one child out of this anxiety or poor relationship with numbers and poor relationship with the language of mathematics. And that's something which, you know, is very, very dear to my heart. And it's my passion and has always been my passion.

That is a, by age 11, kids either get it and love it or at least like it or they don't. I've got an 11-year-old. She likes maths, actually. Interestingly, she loves maths. So if she likes maths, she is likely now to do well. But I didn't like maths and I found it very hard and so I understand what you're saying because essentially you go to secondary school and they're building on a

foundation that you don't have so they start adding more and more complicated maths but if you don't understand the basics which I didn't it's's terrifying. And you're so right, then the language, so much of maths is understanding the bloody question in the first place. Yeah, I think too, it's this idea of being confident. Like, I always think of myself as being good at maths. I don't know. But I've always been somebody kind of in the arts, a writer, etc. And I don't know that I'm actually better at math than a lot of other people kind of in my field, but because I've always thought, yeah, I'm good at math that even when I'm confronted with a problem, I think, Oh, I can figure it out. I can work it through.

And even it's just that idea that I wonder Wendy, if there are people like you who think, oh, I'm not good at maths. It scares me. They're actually they're not not good at it. It's just that feeling they have. Right. This is and I'm, you know, in all walks of life, whether you talk about relationships or anything, I think the thing that people forget is where do you live? If you ask somebody, where do you live? Oh, I live in Bristol.

You live in London or wherever. But you actually live in your head. The only sense of anything that you have is in your mind. So if you are confident about something, you believe it. And therefore you live it. So it's exactly what you're saying which is that confidence i you know people go can you cook i go i'm great do you know what i am an amazing cook i'm not but if i say it with confidence then they go yes this is really nice if i cook them something because i've convinced them it's a bit of a sales talk to myself, I think. But I am. But the confidence with maths comes from this early age.

And it's something that, you know, we have, oh, God, hundreds and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of pieces of evidence for children where we have taken them. My son was a special needs child special educational needs child so and my daughter has just got a phd from cambridge in nanotechnology so you can see the difference in you know this this girl was like oh great mom i'm going to be doing my maths oh you know from the age of four my son very different so I learned how to teach strugglers and that is fundamentally and give them confidence fundamentally what we do on the maths factor kids who love maths do exceptionally well but to me the very special

ones are the ones who've struggled some of them autistic some of them just strugglers some of them not being taught particularly clearly in school and they get that moment when they literally they say oh I got it and their confidence we have all the data you know and it's 90 something percent of parents who've had children on the maths factor say that the confidence in their child grows within a couple of months of working with me magnificently but here's what happens is it's not just confidence in maths so everyone says to a child young child oh maths is hard that's what that's basically what's pushed out there so they think oh maths is hard and they start to you know physically go into themselves and then when they they get the answer to something and they understand it their confidence grows in class

to the point where a lot of our kids become top of the class and then they're confident they are now the best or one of the best at the hardest subject so now their confidence in life grows and we can see it you know and they send us videos and all sorts of different things and we can see it also because we're an online school we see it in their results of their percentage that they get right in every little homework as we we call them, that they do with us. So it's factual. It's a fact. And it's about that clarity, really. Absolute clarity of learning and teaching. So how can parents make maths more accessible and fun at home? I mean, obviously, they can go on and use something like the maths factor. Overall,

what can we do to just really make our kids love or even just, you know, feel like, yeah, maths. I think the key, the thing that is really the one thing you must not do is say maths is hard. Oh, I hate maths. Those are the two things. Sorry, Wendy, I'm not looking at you particularly if have you ever said that to your children Wendy no no no I've got a husband who's got two maths A levels and did a maths degree maths is like loved in my house I just keep but everybody does say oh mummy's rubbish at maths but if there's maths homework to be done it's definitely daddy who gets asked but But I've never said it's hard. I've said mummy finds it hard, but I haven't said it's hard. But that is a really useful takeaway for parents.

Don't tell your kids that maths is hard. Never. Because it's what the media tells them all the time. It's what telly tells them. It's what, you know, even know even you know competent and very well respected news journalists say because it's a thing to say it's meant to sound clever in some way oh i oh i'm rubbish at maths you know why are you saying that you're patently not or if you are presenting the today program on radio 4 then you shouldn't be if you say

you don't understand percentages because you're interviewing chancellors and ministers you know so it's a strange relationship in terms of the language that's used that our country has with maths yeah and the thing is maths as you you just pointed out, maths is everywhere. You know, do you like sports and do you like to keep the stats of your favourite sports stars? You know, do you like cooking? Do you like, you know, music? Like all those things. Exactly. It's everywhere. Numbers. Numbers, but in a good way.

Yeah. And one of the things I have argued for for years is this. There is, you know, mathematics is a bigger subject than numbers, but for most people, for the vast majority of people, only need number work, to be honest. But the maths curriculum is put together, and history curriculum and many more, but maths particularly, and you'll understand this, Wendy your husband will it starts with what does a maths graduate or an engineering graduate at a fine university need to have in their knowledge bank in mathematics in order to go to that university this is how curricula are set so from that what then do we have to put into the a level curriculum so you're talking about this like four percent five percent even less and something so then what do they need to do for their gcse in order to go on to study a level maths or a level further maths in order to go on to university to be a physicist or whatever

it might be and my argument is that the vast majority of people need never touch trigonometry other than as a little interesting little module algebra to a level is quite interesting but who really needs to know the answers to quadratic equations you don't so I would always argue that there should be two GCSEs others would argue against me and it's the academics who argue against me on this but I would rather that you, someone who's struggling with numbers has clarity in their teaching, clarity in the curriculum, rather than struggling and failing with stuff that they will never, ever, ever, ever, ever in their lives use again. Maths can unlock not just a lifetime of learning. It can set your child on the road to a career as an astronaut,

engineer or maths genius like the founder of the Maths Factor, Carol Vorderman. On The Maths Factor online platform, kids get weekly maths lessons and guidance from Auntie Carol, exploring topics for year one through to year seven pupils with a suite of video tutorials, interactive games and fun challenges. Check out The Maths Factor to get your child learning and loving maths today. Now back to the show. So do you have any other little takeaways for parents? Don't say maths is hard, number one. Anything else for parents who, like me, have had a strange relationship with maths? How can they not pass that on to their kids and what can they do if they're other than signing up to the maths factor and talking to auntie carol what else can they do to kind of help kids love maths or at least not be scared of maths i think it's it's in the practice i think if you are struggling yourself there is a way maybe of on a book or on a YouTube

video or something to say, I'm going to sit down, I'm going to learn it with you. So rather than say, oh, it's hard, and I can't do it. So you know, there are a lot of free materials, we have a lot of free materials on the maths factor, where you can sit and you can watch together. And a lot of parents have appreciated that. If you don't want to go on the maths factor where you can sit and you can watch together and a lot of parents have appreciated that if you don't want to go on the maths factor then there's something else you know but there's a lot that's free there and learn it together whether it's from their little textbook or the sheets that they're sent to go home rather than you just do your homework because the parent is frightened of the subject you're starting that but also don't be afraid to ask what you think are stupid questions no question is stupid if a child does not understand and says I do not understand the

child is not stupid the teacher is not teaching properly so it is important for every child that no question and please say this to your children no question is a stupid question failure is where is if i as a teacher can't give you an answer and and that is a it's a whole different way of looking at educating and learning and it is a it's a critically important one and I know I say that you know from all the tears that I've cried when my son was young and you know it was oh he's stupid he's stupid well he's just got a master's degree from dundee university it was just that the ways of teaching him needed to be adapted you know that's something that that we concentrate on so you there are different with obviously with my subject with numbers you know you have children

like my daughter who's like like i was you know i'll get it i get it i get it i get it you know they always get 100 98 and they're just racing against time it's just a speed exercise for them and then you get those right at the the lower end who need different levels of explanation and then you get the vast majority you know in the middle who can can't go as fast as the ones at the top and and so on but any decent teacher should be able to explain to the child who is struggling but and to take it down a level to them to really understand where their problem is and that's what we do because if they don't get you know 70 in their test or something we go well you've done really anti-carot comes on you've done really really really well and i am so proud of you

so our next your next lesson in anti-carot is going to be about and they don't know but i'm taking it into another depth of understanding for them so that then they come out next test they get 95 out of 100 so it's and then they go and then it's like oh and they can print out certificates after every test and you know they have their whole walls are covered in their certificates of how much maths they've done and how well they've done and then they start to believe back to what I was saying that confidence if you believe you can like like you were saying Jen you know you believe you can do maths I can figure it out it's that I think is the other takeaway is is to say to a child no question is a stupid question and no child is stupid I know factually that the kids who come on with us all do well.

And that's been going 12 years now. The sense of kids being rejected, you know, by the school, by teachers, by other pupils. You know, you've spoken about how heartbreaking and difficult that is as a parent. And you've talked a little bit about how you encourage in the teaching, but how do you encourage a child academically when they don't kind of fit the mold or they're not getting that positive feedback on their efforts at school?

How do you deal with that as a parent? I think if they have special educational needs, as my son did, he was off the scale dyslexic and so on. He was in a special school for about four or five years in the end, because I found that I didn't have the knowledge base. I'm a good teacher, but I didn't have the knowledge base of how to teach a special educational needs child. And sadly, in the UK, there isn't much support for them. Budgets have been cut in local authorities for the support that they tend to have a unit of teachers and helpers who would then go into schools once the child has has been validated as having special educational needs some people are waiting years for that educational psychiatrist

test it's not a good place at all at the moment we may see that kind of getting worse if there are further cuts that the government's talking about yes i can only see it getting worse if there are further cuts that the government's talking about. Yes, I can only see it getting worse right now because they end up as the forgotten ones. But the sad thing is, I'm desperate to do a documentary about it on the telly to highlight it, is that a massive percentage and the majority of those in young offenders institutes are severely dyslexic you know and yet you also have 40 of self-made millionaires who are also dyslexic so there's a point at which they go one way or the other so for an entrepreneur you would say what does that entrepreneur well they have to have a unique view on life they have to you know they fit every little box that's said there and and yet you know in the young offenders institutes i saw my my boy who is like remarkable of course i'd say that because i'm his mum he's 25 now and we live

together he is the kindest most centered young person i think i've ever come across and he was bullied at school and all of those things but I remember when he was five when these issues were coming to light because of course all the kids are being taught how to read in class and he was as good as gold both my kids been as good as gold at home and yet he was being thrown out of the classroom and at the end of one term the head teacher said I can't I just can't accept him in this school anymore why because he's fighting and he's doing this and he's doing that so here's this lovely kid who is trying his best to distract others because everything on the page is physically jumping round in his eyes and there are some incredible memes and pieces now which explain it to the

likes of us who aren't dyslexic what that looks like uh there's one that he showed me and there's a little paragraph of a few uh sentences and we go on it and the letters are always jumbling around we're like well i can't oh good grief i can't read it i can't read it then you hit stop and it comes to what you and i would read and And then you think, God, I didn't realise that. And then there are all the issues of ADD or ADHD and should children take Ritalin or Ritalin equivalent, which my son has done since he was six or seven. No side effects other than he's able to concentrate and not fall asleep.

There are lots and lots of issues, I think, there, but you need specialists in that area when their learning difficulties are so bad. And I think we're wasting massive potential of young people who see the world differently. I spend my life giving back to education, giving bursaries to kids, doing reports, encouraging children from state schools, I was a free school meals kid, to apply to some of the finer universities. And that's a big part, which is never written about in the papers. Doesn't make a great headline, Carol. Of course it's not. Well, you've segwayed very nicely into the next thing I was going to ask you about, which does make a great headline, which is all the ages claptrap that you have to put up with you recently

got told I quote to act your age after trying to learn to do the splits which I want to know if you can do by the way but how do you navigate this sort of nonsense well the thing is I've always had to so when I was when I not my mother or my grandmother was 39 in the 21st century year 2000 I went to the BAFTAs and I wore a short dress not a micro skirt how dare you I know they made a Kilroy show on the BBC and they flew this dress in from Paris it was an ungaro dress beautiful dress from Paris and this huge debate in the studio was not is this a nice dress the debate was should a woman age 39 wear a dress above the knee I mean well exactly exactly but oh the vitriol was extraordinary. Carol, how very dare you. Get your knees out, woman. Come on.

I am a very free thinker. So I don't judge people. If that's your thing and you're not harming anybody, that's your thing. So I've always rebelled. I've had to. But that's not rebellion. That's just wearing a frock. I know. So then we move on. But here's the interesting thing to me. So bearing in mind that all the other women around the age of 40 at that time

were brought up as I was, which was we were told to get married, you know, as soon as possible. And we were told, I'm not against that. That's what people choose to do but we were told you should marry a man who's going to look after you you should do all of these things so it was always and you should play set always the woman was you should play safe you should do that we go on 20 years the vast majority of women work you know they either choose to work because they want to

or they have to work for financial reasons or a little bit of both so now you've got women with financial freedom and so on and so it's now it's like these younger generations I would say you two are of a younger generation and the generation beneath that they are supportive of what I do if that makes sense so so now it's like vast majority of opinions are supportive so anyone who goes oh act your age what is that meant to be society's rules change consistently so what does act your age actually mean? Because then if you get to 70 and you're doing the splits, oh, good on her. You know, it's like, oh, it's a strange period of time. Where's the crossover?

And can you do the splits yet? Come on. Well, I'm getting there, girls. So one of the things is, as you get a little bit older and you post menopause, is that, you know, you start to get a little creak here and there and so on. And I've always been pretty healthy and I enjoy good health. In other words, I have good health and I use that good health. So I love hiking and I go paddle boarding and I do all sorts of different things. I had a fall when I was hiking and my knee was a bit, and I just thought,

oh, I'm getting a bit, ooh,'m getting a bit and I don't like that so I can only really work with targets so I have to have a challenge so if you said to me oh I wake up in the morning and I hate I bloody hate yoga it's just boring and I've tried it but it's dumb and and so I'm not that person right so I like a challenge so my challenge for flexibility is to be able to do the splits and there's this eastern European guy his name I can't pronounce and I've paid 10 quid for his lessons and he's obviously doing it in a flat where he's only got a stool with three legs that's all you need and it was the picture of this isn't like all done to music and all lovely this is like your basic stuff and there's a picture of this woman who must be in her

90s doing this doing the front splits with the head on the knee and i thought yeah she'll do for me and it's good and it's literally just keeping on doing it and so i start my stretching because i only do the bits that I like first thing in the morning I touch my toes and I see how far I can either get down or can I get my hands on the floor or whatever it is that's like my basis then I do my 20 minutes of the bits that I choose to do and then I try and touch my toes again again it's like I like markers I like data look she's even managed to get maths into doing the splits Jen I know I love again it's like I like markers I like data look she's even managed to get maths into doing the splits Jen I know I love it it's great so I was that far away from

the floor on the front split now I'm like three inches or so I need a new party to it girls that's the thing we need something to get in the sun over surely for the male I have to say, so I mean, you've, you talk very positively about being health conscious, physical health, mental health. I like these, these tips, because also as a mum, as a fellow single mum, I'm always like trying to make sure I have time to look after my health. So I like this, this you know only like work with targets do something that you like or the bits that you like pick out the bits that you like yeah pick out the bits that you like and also because women are never told this be a bit selfish or what we were are told is selfish it's not selfish at all it's just it's been ingrained

into women's heads that looking after yourself a bit or having a bit of time for me is selfish. It's not. But if that's how you do it, then be a bit more selfish, you know, because the actions that women, and we're just talking about women now, do as regards to their health in their 40s leading on to the menopausal years is critical and i've post-menopause maybe five so i'm 62 in december and i i've seen the difference between someone who has looked after their health and and one who hasn't grows in the 50s you start to see it you know uh dramatically where people and a lot of it is is what you eat vast majority is what you eat but there there's some very interesting science now um about cellular renewal and these zombie cells as they're called these senescent cells which build up in your body

and how to get rid of them um and to give you energy and the one thing so I've been a great proponent as you know you know uh bioidentical hormones um to get me through uh the menopause and post-menopause it's thyroid I was getting very very sluggish well I've got an underactive thyroid so well then you know I know I've had an underactive thyroid just small segue for anyone out there I was diagnosed with an underactive thyroid after I'd had multiple miscarriages so your hormones were all over so your hormones were all over. So my hormones were all over the place. It was only when in England, you have to have three miscarriages before anyone really does anything. Let's not go down that rabbit hole right now. But they did blood tests

and discovered I had an underactive thyroid. And I can now tell when my levels have changed, and I have to go and get tested for different drugs. So it's really interesting. So once I hit the menopause, clearly I'm going to have to change my drugs. This is interesting. I find it fascinating because people say, oh, I have to go to my doctor to have a blood test. Now, obviously, if money is an issue, there are lots now. I use a company, and I don't promote them or anything. I'm just telling you what I do, called Medichecks.com.

And they, if you spend an extra 20 quid or something, they'll send a nurse around to take the bloods for you. And you get these fantastic reports so i because i'm fascinated by good health and and how the science has has come around over the last 20 years particularly the last 10 um and so i've kept a record of where my hormones are and so on. Every six months, they have one of their tests. And it's brilliant because they give you the graphs. Again, we're back to maths, but they give you the graphs of how it's varying. Sorry.

And then I was so tired. And my weight, you know, I know what my weight should be depending on what I eat, based on how it was in my 40s and my early 50s. It's very different post-menopause. So I thought, well, I can't understand this. I just can't lose the bloat. La, la, la, la, la, la. And I'm tired.

And is this what old age is? I thought, no, bugger that. Let's have a look at the science. So with thyroid, you know, there are the three hormones and so on. So I'm just talking about one, the main one, the thyroxine. So there's a band where you, Wendy, are in the red band. So you have an underact, a hypothyroid. And then there's this massive green band above which is another red band, which is hyperthyroidism so the NHS would say if I was at the bottom of the band but I wasn't critical so they'd say oh no you're fine well I'm sorry I wasn't fine

now that might be fine for someone who's 35 and most of the clinical trials by the way are done on men not on women so I found myself a private doctor and she who was what's called a functional medicine doctor so they're about health not illness and uh she went no no I'll put you on the thyroxine I am buzzing I tell you and I'm back to where I normally am I'm eating well and I'm back to the size I like to be. And, you know, and the energy is off the scale. And it's fantastic because it gives you confidence back. And you think, no, it's not. You know, if I'm going to take, you know,

oestrogel or testosterone and all those things, you're just taking hormones because the body at some point, why wouldn't I take a thyroid hormone? And those are the things that people don't talk about and I think a lot of aging is is that we're not looking at the hormones enough for men and women it's really interesting and especially I think for you know the netmums audience we're often you know we we think about the beginning of the kind of hormonal journey with trying to conceive and pregnancy. And we don't necessarily think as much the later part of that hormonal journey, you know, often because that's when our children are also, you know, becoming young adults. And so we're really

focused on them. I also have a, I have a friend who does a lot of health writing, and I was having lots of problems with joints and whatnot all of a sudden. And basically, she's like, yeah, motion is lotion. You got to move every single day. I like that. Motion is lotion. Motion is lotion. And actually, after seeing lots of doctors about this, that and the other, suddenly it's like, well, if I exercise and work out and do some amount of kind of what we think of as physio every day, there's such a difference. And a lot of us, you know, if we're running up and down the stairs all day, that is also motion. emotion but sitting in the telly for six hours which I do occasionally when I'm shattered you know and back from a week's work you get up and you're quite you know you make the sound sitting

down and getting out of the oof the oof sound like Carol I was just gonna say before we let you go I have to take you back to your dim and distant past and talk to you about Countdown, where it all began. It's a national treasure. Was it as fun as it looked? Yeah, with Richard it was. So we started 40 years ago, November the 2nd, 1982. I was four. You were four. 40 years ago.

And it was a huge show. And I hadn't applied for the job, but my mum had written a letter to the producer and forged my signature. That's how I got on. So that's where it started. And then we laughed and laughed and laughed and then eventually sort of co-hosted it, if you like,

because I was only answering the numbers game um every other day to start with so and countdown grew and then this love for countdown really grew so it's channel four's biggest show for about 15 years before you know he took all of their um evening programs and everything there was a great there was just a love for it and i think with richard and i we we loved countdown it was a living thing for us because and we never called people who watched countdown viewers they were countdowners because we were all in this family together you know this ridiculous family of countdowners we happened to be on screen where we just take the mick out of each other all the time and and they would take the mick out of us and we loved it and you know and

it was it was a thing it was a living thing And it wasn't a pretense in any way. So when Richard died very, very suddenly, that was the greatest amount of grief I've ever had in my life. Because it was very sudden. Well, I feel like we're ending on a sad bit now. And it's been so happy. Well, I don't think. No, I mean, obviously, it's tragic that he died so young.

He was 61, the age I am now, when he died. And he left the party too soon and he was a party animal and was utterly ridiculous. And I absolutely loved it. Even on the days when we weren't in the studio, he would be in my life because every person I saw talked to me about him what's that rich white you really like him and you know and all of these things so I life is a series of chapters and some of them are very happy and just because

they end doesn't negate how happy they were so that was happy happy happy happy and I was it was a great privilege to to work on it yeah yeah old countdown as I call it. Carol what a lovely way to spend a day chatting. Yeah well thank you for putting up with my very long answers because I know I bang on about we have a long answer that's all good and and it's uh you know and and thank you to everybody for listening because you know there are different ways of looking at life and um and no question is a stupid question not even when windy and i ask it so that's good news Good news. No question. Thank you, Carol. And let us know when you can do the splits, please. Believe me, the world will know once I manage it. Because I'll never be able to get up again.

That's the problem. And here lies Carol Vorderman. In the splits. And on that note note ladies and gents we're going to go and have a cup of coffee thank you for joining us Carol thank you girls

thank you