Sally Lindsay is all smiles, dressed to the nines in a figure-hugging polka-dot dress with a big steaming mug of coffee in her hands.
It’s been a long day for the actress, who has been chatting for hours about her role in new telly drama Cold Call – but, with nine-year-old twin boys Louie and Victor to look after, she’s used to soldiering on.
‘I’m always up at about six o’clock in the morning,’ she says with a grimace, blowing on her hot coffee.
‘You know how a drunk person tries to be quiet? That’s Louie, banging about and whispering “shhh” very loudly around the house.
'It’s an exciting day for me today, though – I’m having my oven cleaned. I think I’m turning into my mum.’
It happens to all of us, we agree, but for Sally, the transformation is almost complete.
‘When we’re out for dinner and my mum’s finished, she’ll brush imaginary crumbs off the table. I’ve started doing it and I’m horrified. It creeps up on you and all of a sudden you’re getting excited about half-price washing tablets.
'My husband Steve [White, the drummer from 80s Brit band Style Council] went out and bought a Kärcher window cleaner. It’s amazing and I’m a total sucker.’
Born and bred in Stockport, Sally is as lovely as she seems on TV, and attracts the kindest, funniest friends in the business, from her ex-Corrie co-star Suranne Jones to our favourite feel-good presenter Gok Wan.
‘Oh, he’s Auntie Gok to my kids,’ she giggles.
‘He’s their Gokmother and we speak almost every day. I’m very lucky to have great mates in the industry – I can have a moan about the best job in the world.’
It’s her school friends, though – the girls from the old days – who have really kept Sally grounded.
‘There’s my best friend, Claire, who I met when I was 10, and Emma is another school mate who I looked after when she came over from Bridlington,’ she says.
‘When I became famous, or whatever you want to call it, it didn’t bother them at all. Fame is the most bizarre thing that can ever happen to a human being.
'It still freaks me out that someone would recognise my face above anybody else’s.’
Since her breakthrough roles in Fat Friends and The Royle Family, Sally’s been a familiar face on our screens, playing Shelley Unwin in Coronation Street , appearing in sitcom Still Open All Hours with David Jason, and Mount Pleasant, which follows the comical day-to-day adventures of a Mancunian woman and her plumber husband.
Sally has been a regular on the Loose Women panel, and lent her voice to the murderous villain Piella Bakewell in Wallace And Gromit: A Matter Of Loaf And Death.
‘It was a total accident that I became the Bake-O-Lite girl,’ she reveals. ‘Nick Park heard me mucking about on the radio and I got the part.
'My whole life – even becoming an actress – has all happened by chance. My agent put me in this showcase and casting directors came, mostly for the free wine and nibbles.
'The next day I got the call to be in The Royle Family as Twiggy’s girlfriend, Michelle. I really came in at the top and it was so exciting.’
In fact, Sally was so busy on TV, she didn’t even think about having children until she met her husband Steve. That’s when her biological clock started to tick and the pair decided to give parenthood a go.
‘I thought it was made up, you know, that urge that you desperately want to procreate,’ she muses.
‘I couldn’t believe it when it happened to me. I’ve got loads of extremely successful single women mates with massively full lives, and I thought that would have been me.
'It’s because of Steve that we have Victor and Louie. They’re brilliant, hilarious and cheeky and they’ve changed my life. I would die for those boys.’
In the Channel 5 thriller Cold Call – which begins next week – Sally channels her maternal side to play the role of June, a single mum who loses her job and gets stung by a fraudulent cold call.
Robbed of all her money, her house and her mother, she digs deep and finds the strength to hunt down the man who ruined her life. The four-part drama follows June down a slippery slope to get her revenge.
‘We’ve taken the lid off this horrible thing that happens to so many people,’ she explains.
‘If your family was threatened and you’d lost everything, I think you’d find anger from somewhere. June has always done the right thing. She’s a caring person so she became a carer
'Her husband left her and she protected her child. No one’s ever helped her. She’s done everything herself and I think that takes absolute and unbelievable resilience.’
With 20 years of telly under her belt, Sally has got used to being stopped in the street and recognised everywhere she goes, but her first taste of fame on Corrie was a bit too hot to handle, as she explains.
‘There were only five channels then and Corrie was getting up to 20 million viewers. That’s a lot of people who see you in their living room every day,’ she says, eyebrows raised.
‘Those were the days before reality TV, when actresses were on the covers of magazines.
'Fame is more dispersed now and no one gives a monkey’s in London. Even Helen Mirren can get on the Tube. In Manchester, everyone thinks you’re part of the family and that’s lovely.’
While Sally now takes fame in her stride, her sons Victor and Louie have very different ideas about their mum’s excitable fans.
‘Vic whips their phone off them and sorts it out. He’s very nice with people, but Louie is not into it. He just stares at them.’
She laughs.
‘Once they wanted to do their own television show for school. I wrote four sketches of them playing Romans and did a proper programme meeting, pens and everything. After five minutes, they were really bored. They’re more into football or David Bowie.’
Sally makes her daily life off-set sound like a breeze, from family breakfast to school run, chores and errands, to dinnertime back at the ranch.
‘It is pretty dull,’ she tells us, chuckling, but sometimes she gets it hilariously wrong.
‘The boys love Queen and Who Wants To Live Forever is one of the title songs in Highlander. So I said, “Why don’t we watch that together – it’s not bad, is it? They’re mature enough.”’
She shrugs, grinning. ‘Second scene: decapitation. I forgot about that bit.’
While the Christmas holidays are high on her agenda – ‘we’re getting the chimney swept so we can have an open fire!’ – it’s a busy few weeks ahead for Sally.
We’ll see her back in Weatherfield for Coronation Street’s 60th anniversary documentary, Queens Of The Street, and she’ll be popping on her comedy hat with Johnny Vegas and Sian Gibson (of Peter Kay’s Car Share) for Gold’s Dial M For Middlesborough, a brand-new and hilarious murder mystery set in a caravan park.
‘Dial M For Middlesborough is hysterical,’ she reveals. ‘My character is larger than life and so completely made up. I love anything I can get my teeth into and I love who I work with.’
How do you spend your Sunday?
■ Lie-in or up with the lark?
I’d love to have a lie-in. I dream of the days in Corrie when we’d go out on a Friday night and I’d get up at 11 the next day. People don’t understand until they have kids, but they’re ace and totally worth it.
■ Fry-up or fruit?
Every weekend we’ll have brunch with the children. It’s not remotely civilised, because the boys have just come back from football and they stink and we’re trying to get them in the shower
I don’t eat breakfast in the week. If I’m hungry, I’ll have something boring like All Bran. It keeps you regular.
■ Telly or book?
I can get carried away with a book. I have to wait until I’m on holiday, but even then it’s difficult to finish a book with nine-year-old twins. I finished three this holiday, though, and one of them was a Jilly Cooper.
■ Entertain or eat out?
I like going out for dinner, but it depends on the mood of the boys. If they’re tired it’s not worth it. I used to love going out with Steve when we first got together. We still do romantic stuff now and again.
