Asked in court what word she would use to describe William Roache, his on-screen wife replied:
"Lovely."
Anne Kirkbride, who plays Deidre Barlow, entered the witness box at the sex abuse trial of her fellow Coronation Street veteran to testify to his good character.
She was followed at Preston Crown Court by co-stars Helen Worth, who plays Gail McIntyre, and Chris Gascoyne, who is Roache's on-screen son, Peter.
Roache, 81, was the caring and kind "father figure" and "elder statesman" of the show, who looked after younger members of the cast, the jury were told.
Kirkbride, 59, said she had never seen anything worrying about Roache's behaviour on set with young women from when she joined the show in about 1972.
Louise Blackwell, QC, defending, asked the witness how she felt on joining Coronation Street.
She replied: "I was terrified for my first day. Very nervous going. It was a completely new situation. I didn't know anybody. I very quickly got to know people and it became easier."
Asked what she thought of Roache on meeting him, she said: "He was friendly. I remember the first time I spoke to him was outside a lift and we had a really nice chat and he offered me a cigarette."
Helen Worth, 63, told the jury she joined the show in 1974, aged 23.
She said she was "extremely nervous" when joining the show "as any young actor is to this day" but she was soon made to feel welcome.
"But Bill perhaps was caring more and welcoming to me then," she added, "And has been to every new member of the cast since."
Mr Gascoyne described him to the jury as: "Kind, warm, open, good sense of humour. Professional."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article