Let’s just put it on the record, here. I knew Mary Linders was a star long before Dermot Bannon discovered her and ended up beating a hard bag of flour with a rolling pin at her instruction, writes Terry Prone.

WE lost custody of the garden a couple of years back.

She knew where every plant was hidden under the overgrown weeds, and had the Latin name for each. She had a particular hatred for a plant called a Veronica, a low-slung woody bush that would take over the world if you let it. Piles of uprooted Veronicas grew higher and higher.