Moving on

In my early days at the BBC, news trainees got the chance to spend time with all sorts of bigwigs, part of a very enlightened sort of view of what would make us useful. We had a session with Bill Cotton in early 1974, when he was running "light entertainment". "Are You Being Served ?" was part of a big stable of sit-coms - and Mr Cotton's point to us was that, thanks to the strength of both London theatre and repertory around the country, he reckoned he could have cast that show three times over, and it would still have worked.

Trainees also spent time in BBC bars - though it wasn't compulsory. In 1974 Terence Rigby was still, for most people, PC Snow, ex of Z-Cars and now in "Softly Softly: Taskforce". We would see him in the Langham Bar, propping up the bar with a pint in a dimple glass in his hand, wearing a smart black donkey jacket - in a style which led us to believe there was not much method acting in the tv creation of Britain's favourite dog-handler. We kept looking for Inky or Radar, the two dogs ...