Cilla Black

“I remember one day my son, our Robert, was looking at me on the settee and looking at me on the television, and then all of a sudden he said: 'Why don't you bring that pretty mummy home with...”

“I'm a 'never say never' girl. Frank Sinatra retired four times. He kept coming back. But there are people in our business who want to die on stage. Literally. I don't want to do that.”

“There's a whole generation out there who don't know that I was a pop singer in the early days.”

“When I was put up in posh hotels, I thought it was wonderful.”

“On my gravestone, I want 'Here lies the singer,' not 'Here lies the T.V. presenter'.”

“I've had days when I go in my bedroom for 24 hours at a time. I call them my Cilla Black days, and they're literally black days. It's like the old Boomtown Rats song 'I Don't Like Mondays.'...”

“But reality television is here to stay.”

“I'm a Roman Catholic. Or was. I was brought up that way and used to say my prayers every night, but I don't pray to God any more. I might use the usual phrases I picked up from my parents, '...”

“I'm quite subdued, believe it or not. I switch it on for the camera.”