I was in the National Youth Theatre, too, but there was no dancing there. I was doing plays like 'Julius Caesar' and playing the lute very badly.

I really want to emphasise this - 'Strictly' is a positive show. It's interesting that it gets cast into this, understandably, the ordinary net of reality shows, but there's no part of it which feels nihilistic or unpleasant. It's all about learning something and doing well, and you feel this overwhelming sense of people wanting you to do well.

Learning about crime in great detail forces us to ask ourselves how it happened, how the victims and perpetrators got to that point, how the law works, how the police force functions.

I used to deal with high-profile criminal cases that were covered extensively in the media, and one of the things I quickly appreciated was there was a gulf between what really took place in the middle of a case, the impact on victims, the effect on the police and how they solved crimes, and the way it was reported.

You can never turn the clock back and, since we're talking about mental health, I would stress that.

The chemotherapy was very peculiar, something that makes you feel much worse than the cancer itself, a very nasty thing. I used to go to treatment on my own, and nearly everybody else was with somebody. I wouldn't have liked that. Why would you want to make anybody sit in those places?

Of course, plenty of people don't think that guaranteeing affordable health insurance is a core responsibility of government.

I went without health insurance until 'Roger & Me,' basically - from about age 20 till about age 35. With 'Roger & Me,' I joined the Directors Guild and the Writers Guild, and since then I've had excellent health care managed by the union.