Last Thursday, the narrator hosted an afternoon tea event in the snug area of a bar near the Curve Theatre in Leicester City Centre. During the event, several attendees arrived, including an actress from EastEnders, Charlie Brooks, and her family. Earlier, the narrator had mistakenly turned away Brooks' mother, thinking she was looking for the bathroom when the woman was actually looking for a place for her family to sit. The narrator realized their mistake when seeing Brooks and her family leaving the bar.

1. Last Thursday was the first FFT event in Leicester City Centre and we decided
to serve late afternoon tea (with beer too!) at The Exchange, opposite the
Curve Theatre.
With the addition of two new banners and my nerves getting the better of me,
I started to set up in the “snug” at the back of the bar. A great choice, as it felt
more like I was sitting comfortably in my mother’s living room as opposed to
waiting anxiously for everyone to turn up.
My firstattendee arrived and as I stood in the snug talking to Matt a woman, in
her 50’s, sauntered in looking around. I asked “can I help you? Are you looking
for the loos?” she responded “no, I was looking for somewhere where my
family and daughter can sit quietly”.
I politely told her that the room was hired for a private event and she put both
hands in the air and said “SORRY” and walked off.
As the room started to fill up the very observant Emma, of Maber Architects,
ran in rather excitedly claiming that there was an Eastenders actress in the bar.
Emma had even gone to the trouble of taking a picture of the said actress and
thrust the image towards me.
We stuck our heads back out of the snug and we could see it was Charlie
Brooks, aka Janine Butcher of Eastenders fame, who is lead role in the
production of Beautiful Thing at the Curve.
We all got a bit over excited and thought of asking her to come in and join us
while we stuffed our faces with cakes and sandwiches. Of course, we never did
as we wanted it all to ourselves.
It was only when I saw Charlie Brooks and her family leaving the bar, looking
through the window at us rather cheesed off, that the woman I turned away at
the beginning of the night was in fact her mother.
I got that one wrong didn’t I?