Archers veteran Peggy has no plans to retire
Spencer first played Peggy Woolley in a 1950 pilot of the radio drama and had no idea she would still be playing her nearly 60 years later.
The only original cast member still in the show told Desert Island Discs host Kirsty Young yesterday: "I love acting so much. I'm lucky to have a job I can still do."
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Hide AdShe spoke fondly of the early days when the show was live and a producer would tiptoe into the studio and cross out lines over her shoulder while she was reading.
Spencer, who was given a three-month contract on 1 January, 1951 and did not expect the show to continue, said she does not have much in common with her Archers character except both love their gardens.
"I don't think Peggy's got a sense of humour and I hope I have," she added.
Spencer nursed her own husband Roger through Alzheimer's until his death in 2001 and used the experience when scriptwriters decided Peggy's husband Jack would also develop dementia.
The actress said she was "all for it" and told them: "Let's get all the publicity we can. Especially the plight of carers, to highlight that as well."
She said delivering the lines was not upsetting but she would sometimes "feel the poignancy of it" when she listened to an episode later.
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Hide AdSpencer said she left school early to care for her mother who "decided she was an invalid" when she was around 40. "I think she thought she'd got heart trouble. She was very anaemic," Spencer said. "She took to her bed.
"She liked me there all the time. I would sit in her bedroom with the curtains closed because she didn't like the light. It was very frustrating for a teenager."