A final personal anecdote to re-tell in the TV fakery saga…A few years back I was the phone-a-friend for Michael Aspel and Carol Smillie on the Xmas “Celebrity” edition of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.

Someone from the production team called me before the show. They told me to let the phone ring three times and sound surprised in case host Chris Tarrant should call. So when he phoned I said “Blimey…” with such a lack of conviction that my wife had to hold a cushion to her face to stifle the laughter.

So that’s pretty modest on the fake scale. What was really odd was that I had never met Michael or Carol. And when I finally saw the show (repeated a year later on ITV something) I had the unnerving experience of watching them say something like – “Let’s ask Adrian – he’ll know,” before hearing my unconvincing “Blimey…” Still, nobody died. And under Michael Grade, I’m sure any fake friends will be given the kind of grilling normally reserved for marriage partners in immigration cases.