In my experience... Baroness Floella Benjamin

It’s more than 30 years since you were on Play School. Do you get annoyed when people still want to talk about it?

Not at all! My 12 years on the show [1976-88] are my legacy and I’m proud that we had such a lasting effect. Play School was the perfect show for young minds. I meet people every day who tell me how much it meant to them and how it changed their lives. It’ll probably get a mention on my tombstone… ‘Here lies Floella Benjamin. Yes, her from Play School’.

It’s your 73rd birthday this year, but you don’t look that different to the Floella I used to watch on Play School. Whatever you’re using, can we have a couple of bottles, please?

Ha ha! I’ve got good genes, but the rest is exercise, watching what I eat and meditation. I took up marathon running at 50. I’d recommend it. You don’t have to go fast or far; just challenge yourself. A run puts me in a good frame of mind.

What’s the best thing about getting older?

When you realise that time is getting shorter, you make more of an effort to enjoy life. And you don’t waste time on regrets. In your twenties and thirties, you spend too much time striving for things you don’t have. Relax. If it’s meant to happen, it will happen.

Your book reveals your private life in some detail. Did you worry about being too open?

Everything in the book was discussed with my husband Keith [Taylor] and my children. But I also wanted to be honest because writing about the traumas we as a family have been through could be useful for other people. When we went on Clare Balding’s Ramblings podcast earlier this year, Keith talked about how miscarriages can affect men [Floella had three after her first child]. So many other men got in touch to say, ‘Thank you for letting me know that I’m not alone.’

You have a special place in TV history. For many young children in the Seventies, watching you or Derek Griffiths on Play School was the only time they came across a black person on the screen.

And it wasn’t just a question of race in the Sixties and Seventies. You hardly ever saw any people who were… different. That might be the colour of your skin, your religion, people with disabilities, homosexuals. The earlier that children come across people who are different, the sooner they will accept them. When young children watched me and Derek on the show, they didn’t see colour; they just saw people full of energy and love. It was only if that child lived in a house with racist adults that it became an issue. In your book, you detail awful racist attacks suffered by you and your family when you first arrived from Trinidad in 1960.

‘I came here full of hope. Proud to be british! Then i noticed grown-ups spitting at me in the street’

Did you know Britain was going to be like that?

I came here full of hope. Proud to be British! Then I noticed grown-ups spitting at me in the street and my mum had to do something that no parent should ever have to do – tell their child that some people hate them because of the colour of their skin. People didn’t try to hide what they were doing because they felt they had a right to abuse us… to hit us or push dog poo through our letterbox. If Mum or Dad complained, they were laughed at and told they had a chip on their shoulder.

Your future mother-in-law didn’t approve when you first met your husband of 42 years, Keith. That must have been painful.

I was at a point in my life where I accepted that other people had a problem with race, and I wasn’t going to let it affect me. Keith had told me that he didn’t have a good relationship with his mum, so we decided to move on with the next phase of our lives. Had she been part of our world, she would have drained love, not given it. It was her loss.

Do things feel different today?

Some things haven’t changed. I was giving a talk at a school in Bradford recently and there was a Muslim girl wearing this beautiful scarf. She said, ‘Floella, people spit at me in the street, too. Can you teach me how to be brave?’ She was only ten! The difference these days is that when white people hear stories like that, they are shocked. They know it’s wrong and they speak out.

You discussed your childhood experiences with The Queen. Did it feel strange?

At the time [2012], she was being honest and open with me, talking about her family, cooking, the Commonwealth, and gave the impression that she wanted to hear about my life. There was something in the way she looked at me that said she understood and there was no offence taken. I could tell she had great empathy. Prince Philip, too. He wrote me a letter telling me that he knew what it was like to come to a foreign country as a child. After he came here [from Greece], he went to Cheam school in Surrey and said he always felt like an outsider.

‘Yes, bowie did invite me upstairs, but i politely declined. Keith rescued me in our Hillman Imp’

What are your thoughts on the controversies over recent royal tours of the Caribbean?

The most important thing is people are talking about it and examining events of the past. If we’re going to move forward together, we have to look at the past, no matter how difficult that is. If something does need to change, then the royals are in the right place to make that decision. It’s a moment in time for all of us.

If you were in charge of diversity and inclusion, what would you change?

I would show people how to live by the three Cs: consideration, contentment and confidence. Treat others as you would want to be treated, be content with your life and love who you are. Then, I would wrap it up in another C – courage. Stand up for truth and justice. Do the right thing! You have two children, Aston, 40, and Alvina, 33.

Was motherhood what you expected?

My mum and dad have always been my role models. They were firm, but full of love… and always there for me and my [three] brothers and [two] sisters. Keith and I were firm, too.I remember when Alvina was about seven and she wouldn’t do her homework. Keith and I played good cop, bad cop, but I was always the bad cop. I laid down the law. When she finished her homework, she ran upstairs to Keith and shouted, ‘Why did you marry that woman?’

What is the secret to a long and happy relationship?

Everything we have is based on friendship and communication. If there’s a problem, we talk it through. No secrets. It’s also important to understand that the children always come first. I’ve turned down some big jobs because it meant being away from the kids. I was asked to be the face of Disney, but I couldn’t leave my children.

In your book, you describe how you danced with David Bowie at his Christmas party and were hanging out with Mick Jagger, Marc Bolan and Cat Stevens. Did David really invite you ‘upstairs’?

My friend was one of Bowie’s backing singers and she invited me to his house. It was surreal… Mick Jagger calling me ‘Princess’, dancing with David Bowie. Yes, Bowie did invite me upstairs, but I politely declined. Keith rescued me in our Hillman Imp and took me home.

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