I Wept All Night After I Was Fired ... continued

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Of this you can be sure, if our producer makes as much fuss of Meg's death as he did with her marriage in 1975, then we can expect a massive funeral in 1981.
 
Mr Barton has said that Crossroads will carry on without me.  That's fine by me, but this is one viewer who won't be watching - the TV screen in my home will be blank.
 
Another way he may finish me off is to have Meg disappear in a fit of apoplexy, complete with a puff of smoke like a wicked witch.  I do know I'm reputed to be something of a firebrand in the studios, explosive with lots of temperament.
 
All this is quite untrue.  You will not find any support for this reputation among the Crossroads cast or the studio technicians with whom I work every week.
 
Tomorrow I'll be back with them again and they'll tell you I may shout around in the studio sometimes but I am always in complete control.  The only time I yell out about anything is when things go wrong because of someone else's stupidity.
 
I have no time for inefficiency or time wasting.  It's been said that I don't suffer fools gladly.  That's true too.  But heated scenes involving myself and the technicians or my fellow actors and actresses?  Never.
 
I have never thought of myself as a great dramatic actress.  The make-believe Meg Mortimer that you see in Crossroads is not all that different to the Noele Gordon who exists in real life.
 
Of course, there are times when I have to appear more pent-up and demonstrative on television than I am in my own home.  Though, in the past week, looking at some of those pictures of myself on the front pages and my appearances on TV news bulletins, I'm not so sure that Noele Gordon hasn't stolen some of Meg's emotional thunder!
 
The secret of whatever success I may have had on your TV screens is entirely due to something with which I was lucky enough to be born, an inbuilt outgoing attraction for which I can in no way claim any particular credit.
 
Call it charisma, if you like.  I just don't know what it is, but it's been there ever since my early days as Tondelayo in White Cargo, at London's Penge Empire.
 
Stage producers used to complain that whenever I was in a play with a bunch of other characters, I had only to stand still and, even if I didn't have any lines to say, the audience would look away from everyone else to regard me.
 
Now this can be most disturbing and upsetting for anyone appearing with me in a straight drama.  But in musicals and variety, where I was expected to give a one-woman show, it was a tremendous asset. 
 
When television came along, this extra dimension which I seemd to possess established me in the forefront of TV personalities from the moment I first faced the cameras with my orginal Midlands' chat show Tea With Noele Gordon.
 
Televison, if nothing else, is a medium for performers who can appeal to the viewers and the camera seems to love me.
 
Of course, I'm not alone with this appeal.  Many stars have it.  Noel Coward called it "that little something extra."
 
And although I wouldn't dream of putting myself in my namesake's category, the fact remains that I have always been aware that I do have this extra certain something which has helped me along throughout my professional career.
 
 

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