A couple of weeks ago, I sent off an application to appear on a TV quiz show. I’ve never done anything like this before, so I’m not really sure why I did it, but anyway, last Tuesday afternoon I had a phone call from a lady called Shelley, who works for the TV company. We chatted for a while, and then she said she’d like to ask me 10 general knowledge questions. The first one was a celebrity one, and I don’t do celebrities, but as luck would have it, I’d seen a headline referring to this, so that was ok. I knew the next few and was starting to relax. Now, I should mention at this point, that I hadn’t told John that I’d sent the application. He arrived home from work while I was answering the questions. I can’t imagine what he was thinking when he walked into the room, to find me shushing him, and saying “cherries” to the phone. To be fair, cherries was the answer to the question “what is Kirsch made from?”
After I’d answered all the questions, Shelley invited me to attend an audition, I arranged the date for the following week. Of course, I then had to explain to John what was going on.
The day of the audition arrived. I caught the train to London at 12:00, much too early as the audition wasn't until 1645, but this was my first trip to London on my own, and I was worried I would get lost on the underground. As it turned out, the underground is really simple, as long has you have step by step instructions written out. So I arrived at Liverpool Street at 14:00 with hours to kill. The audition was in West Kensington. I decided to get off the tube at Knightsbridge and go for a wander. I walked through Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens, stopping off to admire the Albert Memorial and Royal Albert Hall.
I still had time to spare, and realised that I was close to the roof garden on top of what used to be a department store, but is now an office block. I’d visited this about 15 years ago, when we took Pat to London as a birthday treat. Back then it was quite shabby looking, but now it’s all very posh. You can hire it for weddings etc. I think I preferred it how it used to be.
I took a few photos, and the wonderful, if sometimes scary (it seems to know too much about me) Google+ has organised them into a storybook for me. Here’s a link.
Back to the main purpose of this Blog - the audition. I decided that as the weather was going to be very warm, and I would be wandering around for hours beforehand, I should take a change of clothes, and some travel wipes and deodorant. Sorry if this too much information, just skip to the next paragraph if you’re squeamish. After leaving the roof garden, I decided to finish the tube journey, then find a cafe, have a cuppa and use the facilities for a quick tidy up. I thought West Kensington sounded delightful; Kensington Gardens were lovely, Kensington High Street was full of upmarket shops. West Kensington turned out to be the poor relation in the Kensington clan. There was a rough looking pub, a tattoo parlour, several boarded up properties and a taxi office. Then I spotted a reasonable looking cafe on a corner, I crossed the road, approached the door, and read the sign - CLOSED. By now, it was 4:15. I had to be at the audition address by 4:45. The only option left for a quick ablute was the pub. I walked in, located the Ladies and entered, the smallest cubicle in the world…. Five minutes later, I emerged, refreshed, clean top, make-up redone, ready to take on Tipping Point.
I arrived at the address with several other people, all clutching printouts of our emailed directions. We signed in, and waited in a canteen (closed, so no chance of a cuppa) A couple of young men issued us with name badges, and took photos of us. We were then taken into a small room, with chairs lining the walls. Seventeen would-be contestants, starting to feel nervous. We were all issued with a clipboard, pen and a sheet of paper printed with numbers 1 to 25, to record our answers to 25 general knowledge questions. Although we weren’t told the answers afterwards, I know that I got at least 21 right. I can’t remember all of them, but they included:
What is the Patella more commonly known as
What colour coats to Chelsea Pensioners wear
What signalling system uses flags
Which monarch gave the first televised Christmas message
Under which US President did Al Gore serve as Vice-President
After the clipboards were collected, we were told that we would now have to stand up (one at a time) and talk for 2 minutes, to camera. Surprisingly, some of the people were horrified by this. I’m not sure why, because the successful ones will be standing up and speaking in front of a studio audience, not to mention the millions watching on the telly. Anyway, I was 6th to go. A couple of people had “name-dropped”, one woman saying that she works at a shooting club, where celebrities and royals go. So when it was my turn I trumped them with “I’m related to Columbo” and Eric Morecambe saying “Hello” to me and Wendy Baker on the steps of the Luton Town Junior Supporters Club. I also related tales of falling asleep on the back of the motorbike. I managed to talk for my allotted 2 minutes. Some people struggled to keep going, so I hope that I did quite well. It was all over in an hour. We’ve been told that if we haven’t heard anything by the end of November, assume that we were unsuccessful. Some people may get an email by the end of the week to say they’ve been shortlisted.
WATCH THIS SPACE
