'WE WERE GOING TO GET MARRIED BUT THEN WE FOUNG OUR WE'RE HAVING A BABY!'

EMMERDALE'S LAURA NORTON AND MARK JORDON EXCLUSIVELY REVEAL TO OK!'S KIRSTY HATCHER THAT THEY'RE EXPECTING THEIR FIRST CHILD TOGETHER

Laura Norton and Mark Jordon were supposed to be spending 2020 planning their dream wedding, but an impending surprise addition to their family has put those plans firmly on hold.

“There’s going to be a baby shower before a wedding now,” laughs Mark as he and Emmerdale actress Laura exclusively reveal the exciting news that they’re welcoming their first baby together.

When Laura turned up at Mark’s home just before lockdown with three suitcases, the couple never expected to be coming out of it with a little one on the way! But the excitement between the pair couldn’t be clearer. Proud Mark, who’s already dad to Joseph, 22, and Poppy, 19, with his former wife Siobhan Finneran, tells us of his fiancée, “She’s absolutely blossoming.”

Laura found out she was expecting just four days before she was supposed to be returning to Emmerdale following lockdown easing. Fans have been wondering where her character Kerry Wyatt has been over the last couple of months, but now they’ll know there’s a good reason for her absence!

She and Mark met when he joined the soap in 2014, playing her future brotherin-law Daz Spencer. The former Heartbeat actor, who was starring in a UK theatre tour of The Cat And The Canary before lockdown, returned to the soap in 2017 and he hopes to make his return once again.

Here, Laura, 37, and Mark, 55 – who have been together for five years – tell OK! which Emmerdale stars predicted their surprise news and how Mark’s children reacted...

Congratulations! When did you find out you were expecting?