We met at Kingston station and walked along Clarence Street, Angellica hooded up and glasses on (she’s relatively safe during school hours, from swooning children seeking her autograph) chatting aboutdating, marriage and family. Mention her name to anyone under 18 and they all know who you are talking about. Soon the over-18s will get to know her as she is going to be on our screens quite a lot over the next few months. Upstairs in a juice bar, near Kingston Parish Church, Angellica explains that whilst she knows she thrives on challenges, she doesn’t actively seek them out but generally takes them on. On leaving University with a politics degree it was a temporary job at the BBC that led to her ‘being in the right place at the right time and being chatty’ and becoming one of the best known presenters on children’s BBC. Both Angellica’s parents are from St Lucia, although it was in Englandthat they got to know each other. She was brought up in Ealing, but her parents divorced when she was little and when she was 6 her RAF Dad returned to the Caribbean. 12 years later she and her sister went to St Lucia to meet him and other family members. ‘We went for a month, it was great, my dad was like hi, here you are, it was typically Caribbean, understated in a way but easy, familiar.’ He died last year, sadly just before Angellica and her sister could get there. A sad memory and one that is made all the more poignant by one of her current projects with the BBC to be shown in March. ‘As part of this year’s coverage of the abolition of slavery I was asked if I wanted to trace my roots. I can’t ask my Dad but his Mum is still around and they have taken a DNA swab to see where I really started out from. Don’t know what it will turn up but it’s exciting.’She’s quite a modest person for one so used to being treated as a VIP. Which brought us on to Prince Charles, whom she met recently as part of the more grown-up Angellica Bell that we can all see in the spring on BBC1 in The Great British Village Show. She and her copresenters, Alan Titchmarsh and James Martin visited Highgrove, Prince Charles’s home, as part of the series. ‘You know Prince Charles and Camilla, they’re so right together, you can just see it. He was so sweet, he said he could see I ate my veg.’ The dazzling teeth are a clue, Angellica! With Alan and James on board, two of British TVs obsessions, gardening and food will be well catered for. Angellica is very good at asking questions and listening, and she also has a wicked sense of humour. We talked about her leaving children’s BBC. ‘It was brilliant working there, I loved it so it was very sad to leave but it was the right time for me and I wanted to move forward.’ And the future of children’s TV? She says: ‘it’s hard to say where children’s TV is going, there’s such a dire lack of funding, there are so many good programmes but children have so many distractions, internet, play station and there’s a lot of dumbing down.’ She will always be involved with children, although not planning to have any of her own at the moment, and raises money for mainly children’s charities through running marathons and half marathons.‘The first time I went running, I thought I was going to die after about 5 minutes, I felt so terrible, but running is how I discovered Richmond Park and running there is just fantastic. It’s why I moved to Kingston. I love it here, the restaurants, the shops the clubs, the river.’ The running, I remind her? ‘No, definitely, I took it up because I didn’t want to be unfit, I wanted to eat what I liked with me exercising..,’I finish: ‘As a good role model.’ ‘Exactly,’ she continues, ‘and I can raise money for children’s charities by doing runs. With an ex-RAF physical training instructor now personal trainer for a husband, it is hard to find the excuses not to be fit and healthy! Kingston runners may recognise Angellica from the ASICS runs organised by Human Race. The next one is coming up in April and Angellica will be there. In a funny way, running led to her meeting her husband, StuartAmory. Part of a programme she was making for BBC Sport involvedgoing to RAF Brize Norton to film and interview the RAF parachute display team The Falcons, who were running the marathon in their full gear. Strangely enough this was the RAF base where her father had worked. As she walked around the base, she little dreamt that the handsome chatty guy showing her around would one day get down on his knee after a delicious dinner at The Wharf and present her with a beautiful diamond and platinum ring saying: ‘Will you marryme?’. But in August 2005, he did. They are planning on staying in Kingston, Stuart has lots of clients based around here. We agree Kingston is a brilliant place - just as Angellica says “keep it funky”. So when Angellica is not training or working or spending time with her new hubby she has friends over, cooks and entertains and she loves dancing particularly at The Works, in Kingston. She used to sing with her school choir at Notting Hill and Ealing, memorably at St Paul’s Cathedral, and St Peter’s, Rome and somewhere in her house is a cello that languishes for want of playing so its just possible we might see Angellica being very funky herself!