- Born
- Birth nameJayne Claire Seed
- Nicknames
- Claire Seed
- Jayne Claire King
- Jayne Seed
- Height1.71 m
- Claire was born in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, and raised in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, England, with her brother and sister.
Bradford-born King played the dastardly Kim Tate on Emmerdale originally for 10 years from 1989.
She left the soap in dramatic fashion in 1999 and went on to star in a number of TV dramas over the next decade. These included her role as Karen Betts in ITV prison drama Bad Girls for four years.
She also proved a hit on the dancefloor, finishing sixth in the 2006 series of Strictly Come Dancing.
Claire also appeared in Coronation Street, where she played Erica Holroyd between 2014 and 2017. Erica was a friend of Liz McDonald in the show and had a colourful love life on the cobbles, being linked to Kevin Webster, shop owner Dev Alahan among others. She left in 2017 as Erica went back to Spain.
King returned to Emmerdale for a special week of episodes in 2018, before coming back permanently to cause trouble in the soap in 2019.- IMDb mini biography by: anonymous
- SpousePeter Amory(July 1994 - present) (separated)
- Changed her name from Claire Seed as there was already an actress with this name in Equity, the British actors' union; she says the name "King" comes from her love of horse racing (the sport of kings) and Elvis Presley, of whom she is a big fan.
- Underwent a hysterectomy in 2010 to treat fibroids.
- Her Emmerdale Farm (1972) character Kim Tate became the 8th woman on the soap opera to give birth. Kim had a son James (played originally by Jake Meays and later Bradley White), born on 24 September 1996.
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