It’s been a bad week for The Co-op. Its bank is in serious trouble. But at least it can tick off one notable achievement – it’s made me a film star.

In my last blog, I explained how I had become an award-winning author. Now I’m a film star. Och, when you retire, the world’s your oyster, right enough!

Now, the sceptics among you will no doubt have concluded that, yes, I’ve appeared in a film – a neighbour’s home-made movie caught on his mobile phone. But I can tell you that a couple of weeks ago, I attended my film’s premier – a gala event at the multi-screen Printworks in Manchester, a mega-cinema venue whose usual fare is the latest Hollywood blockbusters. And there I was, watching a 20 foot image of myself on the giant screen.

One of my secret ambitions for retirement was to appear as one of those non-speaking extras you see mouthing and gesturing away in the background of the ‘Rover’s Return’ or the café in ‘Eastenders.’

I thought I might make a great lawyer in ‘The Bill.’  You might have seen them with their clients in the station interview room. They were very strange lawyers, right enough. They never uttered a word. I suppose non-speaking extras get paid the minimum wage – say one word and, presumably, you start to earn a three figure rate of pay.

The conversations in that interview room usually went something like this.

Detective: “We know you did it. So we’re going to pull out your finger nails till you confess.”

Silent lawyer: [Looks pensive.]

Detective: “Look, if you don’t confess, I’m going to punch your head in.”

Silent lawyer: [Holds his chin thoughtfully.]

Detective:  “If that doesn’t work, I’m going to fit you up with planted evidence.”

Silent lawyer: [Makes some notes.]

Or I thought I could be one of those officers in “The Bill” who are stopped in the corridor by the station Boss.

Boss: “I want you to contact every chemist and see who bought sleeping tablets over the weekend, then check the CCTV images from the town centre during the last 48 hours and interview all the residents on the Green Estate – and report back to me within the hour.”

Silent officer: [Nods purposefully and strides off.]

Sadly, “The Bill” has been dropped so that’s one retirement ambition gone. But another thespian opportunity came my way – all thanks to the Co-op and the British Youth Film Academy.

I used to work with Martin Gaskell, the Chair of the BYFA.  I happened to be with him during the summer of 2011 when one of the BYFA film directors urgently needed someone to play the role of an ageing, aggressive, cantankerous television interviewer - a more miserable version of Jeremy Paxman. He thought I’d be perfect for the part.

And that’s how I came to appear in “The Last British Execution”, the latest film produced by the British Youth Film Academy.

Every year, the BYFA sets up summer camps around the country. The idea is that professionals from the world of cinema – actors, directors, camera, lighting and sound operators, make-up experts and wardrobe specialists and so on – will work over the summer holidays with young people from schools and colleges. The aim is, over a few weeks in July and August, to make a quality full-length feature film. In less than a decade, it’s made a dozen films.

I’ve seen a BYFA camp in action. The young people have fun but no messing about is tolerated. The standards they have to maintain are very much those of the professional cinema. It’s a great experience for them.

And the BYFA is bank-rolled by the Co-op. It’s invested hundreds of thousands of pounds in the project. Its financial arm might be in trouble but the Co-op remains committed to using its profits for the community’s good.

One of the BYFA films financed by the Co-op is hopefully coming to a cinema near you soon. And it will feature me……for all of ten seconds or so.

I thought I’d keep that bit till last. But it still makes me a star of the screen, doesn’t it?