Trivia

She made her stage debut as a pantomime chorus girl in Bournemouth, earning £2 a week.

In 1929, she went to dance lessons at the Theatre Girls Club in Soho, London and became a noted tap dancer and founded a quartet called Four Brilliant Blondes.

Donated all the money she made from repeats of her television programmes to charities for animals and the elderly.

Ranked #91 in The 100 Greatest EastEnders (1985) Characters of All Time for her performance as Ethel Skinner (2015).

As of 2020 she is the 10th-longest serving actress on the history of EastEnders (1985) (tied with Patsy Palmer, Lacey Turner, Lorna Fitzgerald and Shona McGarty, and behind only June Brown, Pam St. Clement, Letitia Dean, Wendy Richard, a tied Gillian Taylforth and Natalie Cassidy, a tied Barbara Windsor and Laila Morse, Gillian Wright, a tied Diane Parish and Linda Henry, and Jessie Wallace), having played the character Ethel Skinner for 12 years (from 1985 until 1997 and then briefly in 2000).

Ranked #80 in the 100 Greatest EastEnders (1985) Characters of All Time for her performance as Ethel Skinner (2010).

Daughter of Herbert (1887-1954) and Violet (née Priestley) Franklin (1893-1915).