I now live in Beeston. My mum was Italian. She came from near Naples. She used to make the most amazing spaghetti and I loved it. When I started school in London in the early 1950’s, I invited my friends to my home to taste my mum’s spaghetti. But they just looked at it and said ‘Ugh, ugh, your mum cooks worms! Ugh, ugh your mum eats worms!’ But we had a dog called Pickles, and he LOVED my mum’s spaghetti.

My mum loved figs – and every autumn, when I see the succulent figs in the market, I eat one in memory of her, and to celebrate her life.