Happy anniversary

It's our 14th anniversary today. This time 14 years ago, Nathan and I were working on Taboo. I was rehearsing him into the show, having just returned from a five-day trip to the south of France, the only holiday I was able to take in the entire period I worked on the musical. I was still sporting war wounds. My back was red raw and burned from a terrible incident involving Immac and my forehead had a massive gash on it where I'd hit my head on a wooden beam in the middle of the night when our building was struck by lightning.

It was my first day off in what feels like an age today, so we did very little. Highlight of the day was a trip to the Holloway Odeon to watch Finding Dory. The film was okay. It ticked all the boxes and did what it needed to do without setting the world on fire. I had a lovely little sleep in the early part. The Holloway Odeon is a grotty cinema. The loos smell terrible and all the chairs are threadbare. It's such a glorious building, however, with the most amazing grand staircase in the vestibule, so I hope they're not running it into the ground before closing it down.

We had pasta for tea in front of a mountain of reality TV. Watching Bake Off was particularly thrilling. It's always strange when the X Factor starts up and you realise that, by the time it finishes, the year will almost be over.

The cast of Brass are all on a terrible come down at the moment. They're all posting sad messages about what a wonderful time they've had and how desperately they're going to miss their new friends. I remember those days so well. Such joy-filled, heady, endless, emotionally-intense times. When an era ends, it genuinely feels like the end of the world. I thought my heart was going to break at the end of some of the tours and Edinburgh festivals I performed at in the 1990s. When you're that age, you meet kindred spirits for the first time and have the capacity to make life-long, incredibly meaningful friends. I'm still in touch with all the people I did student drama with.