How Loose Women\'s Jane McDonald bounced back when her dreams hit the ...

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In her lowest moments she even thought about giving up singing.

'I started to question my choices in every way,' she says. 'Ithought I had it all, but it was the most unhappy time of my life,in many ways. I was with the wrong person, fundamentally. And whenit all went wrong, I felt like everything had been ripped out fromunder me.

'The fact that Henrik was my manager, too, just knocked myconfidence to smithereens. And that's when I thought, "Maybe I'mnot meant to do this."'

She did gamely carry on though: there were more albums, more tours,and even stints back on the cruise ships, as well as regular slotsas a co-host on the daytime television chat show Loose Women.

There was romance, too, including an on-off liaison with Jarek Pyc,a saxophone player 12 years her junior (he, incidentally, is nowher tour's musical director), but, for years, Jane says she wasfrightened of letting her defences down.

'For the past few years it's been a case of, "Don't come near me,don't get too close,"' she says.

Until now, apparently. For the past four months there has been anew man on the scene - an old flame who waltzed back into her lifein the unlikely setting of the ITV studios.

Jane had last dated Ed Rothe, a drummer in British group TheSearchers, when she was a 19-year-old barmaid at Pussycat'snightclub in Wakefield, Yorkshire, and he was a 28-year-old drummerwith disco group Liquid Gold.

The couple split up after 18 months due to the pressure of Ed'stouring commitments, and lost contact until a chance encounterearlier this year.

'I was having my make-up done ready to go on Loose Women when Iglanced up and saw him being interviewed on This Morning. I said tothe make-up girl, "I used to go out with him," and she said,"You've got to say hello." I said I was too embarrassed.

'I later found out exactly the same scenario was going on down thecorridor. In the end the make-up girl literally dragged me down tomeet him. And when I did, it was like putting on a warm coat.'

They've been together ever since. 'It's frightening, actually,because he's perfect for me. Even my mum said to me, "You'll neverfind anyone better for you than him,"' she says.

He certainly seems to suit her - the white trouser-suited figurebefore me is svelte and groomed, her head a glossy mane of thickhair. 'I feel great,' she says. 'Looking back, in many ways thedivorce was the best thing that happened to me. There is no malicebetween me and Henrik. I still speak to him a couple of times ayear and I wish him well; he is a good man.'

All aboard: Jane with the rest of the crew who kept BBC viewersentertained on The Cruise back in 1997
No doubt there will be some poignant moments when, later thismonth, BBC2 screens Return To The Cruise, in which it revisits theold cast, including the erstwhile lovers. Certainly there will beplenty of cringesome old footage.

'Oh God, I know,' she groans. 'Me in that gold dress and wearing apolo neck where you could see all my chins. I look at that now andthink, "What were you doing?"' she says.

Footage of Jane struggling to keep her audience's attention againstthe lure of the midnight buffet is also, one imagines, guaranteedto be revisited.

'You could never fight the buffet. I'd be stood there thinking,"What have I got to do here?" It makes me smile now, though.'

For Jane, it must, in many ways, seem like a different person: thecruise ship singer expecting nothing more than to get married andhave babies once the cruise was over.
'When I look back, I think, "Bless, she was naive." I want to havea word in her shell-like and whisper her a couple of warnings. But,of course, she would not have listened, because no one ever does.'

Things haven't worked out badly, though. While missing out onmotherhood has been a sadness, she maintains that today, in hermid-40s, she is happier than she's ever been.

It certainly doesn't sound like a bad life - when she's not touringshe divides her time between a bijou central London hotel duringthe filming of Loose Women and her Wakefield home, which she stillshares with her beloved mum Jean.

'She looks after it for me; keeps the home fires burning. That'swhere I put my slippers on, watch Coronation Street and justgenerally kick back,' she says.

I know I'm lucky. I work hard, but I'm lucky in that I love what Ido, and I reap the rewards. And what's the worst thing that couldhappen? I hope people love my new album, but, at the end of theday, if it doesn't work out I could just go back home to Yorkshireand get a job on the tills at Marks & Spencer. And you knowwhat - I'd still work my way up to be a manager.'
Return To The Cruise, BBC2, 7pm, Monday. Jane McDonald's new album, Jane, is also out on Monday (JMD). www.jane-mcdonald.com