'I CAN'T BE A GREY CLOUD OF DOOM'

Singer Linda Nolan opens up on her love of family and friends as she shares her reality of living with cancer

- SARAH MORTON

When we catch up with singer Linda Nolan, who is living with incurable cancer, the morning after our exclusive shoot, we're alarmed to learn she's just suffered another fall, one of many this year.

"My legs just gave way from under me," she tells us, matter-of-factly. "We've got five bath mats down on the bathroom floor, but it didn't matter. I just went."

For Linda, 65, such medical emergencies are now commonplace as she deals with a harsh diagnosis of secondary breast cancer, which has spread to her hip, liver and brain. Despite moving in with her sister Denise and her husband Tom, accidents are inevitable as her body continues to live with the disease that also took the life of her beloved sister Bernie in 2013 at the age of 52.

"I try to stay positive," Linda insists. "I'll use jokes and humour as a way to cope, but of course it's scary. And I have my days where I'm terribly down."

Linda bravely tells us her wish for the year ahead is to "keep breathing and see another one," and despite apologising for her slightly slurred speech ("The cancer's in my brain, I'm not drunk, I promise," she laughs), there's zero self-pity. Instead, Linda keeps us smiling throughout our chat, as she lets us in on her New Year's Eve plans with her sisters, including Loose Women star Coleen.