Alison Steadman is set to become a grandma again and the news couldn’t have come at a better time.
Her alter ego, Pam Shipman, would be shouting it from Billericay’s rooftops, but that’s not Alison’s style when sharing happy family news.
“I’m about to be a grandma again, which is really nice,” the Gavin & Stacey actress reveals to Yours.
The baby, who will be her second grandchild and cousin to her precious “six going on 60” six year-old grandson, is due in April, so it’s an exciting time.
“It certainly is!” adds Alison (77) whose announcement, though understated by Pam’s standards, is every bit as welcome.
“I love kids!” she admits.
“The happiest times of my life were when mine (Alison has two grown-up sons) were growing up and they were at home.
“Hopefully I balanced being with them and working. I just loved it. I love playing games with kids and making things for them.”
Family is hugely important to Alison. Growing up in Liverpool, she was close to her own parents George, an office manager, and Marjorie, a housewife.
Recently, she’s been back there visiting her sick 90-year-old sister in hospital every week.
“She’s not great, so it’s quite sad. It’s nice to have something good on the horizon to balance that,” she says.
The youngest of three sisters, Alison has fond memories of her childhood.
“I was very lucky. I had lovely parents. My mum was always there if I was having a problem or upset, and my dad was a lovely, kind man.” At drama school when phoning home scared before going on stage, her mum was a calming influence.
“She’d always say: ‘Come on! Never say you can’t; always say you can. And you will.’ That phrase has stayed with me.”
Were they anything like Pam and Mick?
“Err no! Nothing like them! Although they are lovely parents. They love their son but [Pam] does get a bit scratchy now and again.”
Is Alison herself anything like clucking Pam as a mum?
“Oh God, I hope not, no!” she laughs.
“The thing I love about the Pam and Mick thing is that it’s always felt so easy to be those two. I love the way she’ll have a go at him and he’ll go: ‘Oh Pammie, come on….’ And when it’s all kind of sorted, she just always falls into his arms and they’re so happy. It’s really nice. We’ve had some good laughs together, we really have.”
Off set they do too as Larry Lamb, who plays Mick, lives 15 minutes away from Alison in London.
