In your 40s & 50s you don't want to be snogging other people... & I won't miss the clingy costumes!

KISSING younger men for a living may not seem much of a hardship to many women in their 40s and 50s, but Emmerdale star Samantha Giles admits to being “mortified” by some of her raunchier scenes.

- SUE CRAWFORD

And now, as she leaves the soap after 25 years playing ditzy Bernice Blackstock, the on-screen smooching is one thing Samantha will definitely not miss.

The married mum of two says: "I don't enjoy those intimate scenes - it's very uncomfortable. When you get into your 40s and 50s, you don't really want to be kissing other people."

Since Bernice arrived in Emmerdale in 1998, viewers have enjoyed seeing her in a series of drunken escapades and raunchy romances, enjoying passionate flings with toyboy Andy Sugden and doctor Liam Cavanagh to name but two.

And while the 52-year-old actress now admits that filming some of those storylines left her "mortified", she knew she had to, erm, just knuckle down to it.

She says: "Bernice is a passionate woman, so I have to throw myself into it wholeheartedly - I just have to take the plunge and brazen it out."

AWKWARD

Samantha remembers one scene where she had to throw herself at Kelvin Fletcher, who plays Andy Sugden and is 13 years her junior.

She says: "I was embarrassed because he was younger than me, so I felt a bit awkward. I thought, Oh God, how awful for him, having to kiss a woman who is probably 15 years older than him.

"Before we filmed it, I said to him, 'Kelvin, just so you know, I'm really going to go for it, OK? Because I didn't want him to think that any part of it was me.

"His face afterwards was a picture, because he wasn't expecting it, but that was good as it made it believable because the character was a bit taken aback, so it worked.