Harry Potter was Made in St Helens

Notable St Helens celebrities include Johnny Vegas, Sir Thomas Beecham, Budgie, Geoff Duke, Pete Postlethwaite, philanthropist John Rylands & Playboy model Louise Glover.

The town where I grew up, St Helens in Lancashire (or Merseyside as the bureaucrats tried to make it), is known - if it's known at all - for two things. It's the home of Pilkington's glass (where my grandfather and various other family members worked), and of St Helens Rugby League Football Club, the best rugby league team in the world.

However, if you do a bit of digging you'll find that St Helens is also home to several other famous names, including a Playboy model and a Vegas comedian. That isn't a Las Vegas comedian, it's local lad Michael Pennington who became better-known as the stand-up comedian, and now dramatic actor as well, Johnny Vegas.

From Vegas to Hollywood, and the Oscar-nominated actor Pete Postlethwaite. Pete was born in nearby Warrington but went to school at West Park in St Helens, where he was a prefect and I can exclusively reveal here that he once gave me 100 lines: I MUST WEAR MY SCHOOL CAP AT ALL TIMES.

Sadly I did not go to school with Playboy model Louise Glover, which would have been tricky as West Park was a boys-only establishment. But she was also born in St Helens. So too were conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, the Siouxsie and the Banshees drummer Budgie, the motorbike racing legend Geoff Duke, philanthropist John Rylands, David Yates (who directed Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) and Paul Harris, who choreographed the same Harry Potter movie. All those and me too. What a place!

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