'WE ALL MAKE MISTAKES AND DO STUPID THINGS'

ACTRESS PATSY KENSIT ON WORDS OF WISDOM FROM ELTON JOHN, HER BATTLE WITH HURTFUL HEADLINES, AND SWOONING OVER EASTENDERS’ PHIL MITCHELL

- ALI GRAVES, MARC BAKER

Patsy Kensit has been a household name for so long that it’s hard to imagine her feeling starstruck. But when we catch up with the gorgeous 55-year-old actress, she tells us that her latest job on EastEnders left her feeling totally in awe of her famous co-stars.

The star, who played Emma Harding – the estranged mother of the late Lola Pearce – on the BBC soap, says, “I was so nervous on my first week when Jessie Wallace [Kat Slater] walked past!” And Patsy reveals that, like many others, she found herself a bit giddy around Steve McFadden, who plays Phil Mitchell. “I swooned over him,” she tells us. “He is so lovely.”

Swooning aside, it’s clear that working on the soap – which she says she’s “watched for years” and is a “superfan” of – wasn’t easy and Patsy admits she had to be on top of her game. “We shot 40 pages a day and you really have to be on the ball. The writing is so great but I was concerned about the volume of scripts I had to learn. Luckily, I have a photographic memory.”

Patsy is chatting to us at a women’s lifestyle event – Postcards From Midlife Live – in Islington, and the glowing mum-of-two looks like a woman in her prime. She’s the first to admit that she’s had her fair share of heartbreak over the years, but Patsy, who got engaged to the millionaire property tycoon Patric Cassidy, 58, in February, looks like someone who is very much at peace with her life these days.

Talking about her romance with Patric, she tells us, “These things happen when you least expect it. I got set up on a blind date, so there you go.”