Okay, I expect full participation from my loyal reader(s) following this post! I've been thinking for a while that my brush with President Bill Clinton a few months ago really deserved a more in-depth exploration of the cult of celebrity. So I got to thinking about my moments-with-the-stars and considered that by sharing these, I could invite you to contribute to a discussion about your own near-misses with those-who-are-paid-to-appear-in-Hello. So, I'll show you mine if you show me yours:
The first brush with celebrity I can remember was when my mum shoved me into a book-signing queue for Danny La Rue's new novel. After seeing Danny La Rue, we quickly left the queue. The next close shave was probably when my entire primary school lined up for an hour to watch the Queen Mother's motorcade speed by in between visits to Cinque Ports. I think I waved to her lady-in-waiting. I never actually saw the Queen mum.
I'm pretty sure it was then more than a decade before my next brush with fame when Neil Kinnock came to speak at my university. I got his autograph, but was a bit star struck and couldn't think of anything to say to the man who had missed out on becoming Prime Minister a few months before.
About two years later, things improved when in my first job I hired Countdown 'star' Carol Vorderman to do a voiceover for a client. So enamored was I with the 'thinking man's totty', that I went on to book Helen Sharman, the first British astronaut for the same client the following year. She was less attractive, but much cleverer than Carol.
About a year later, I might have continued my affinity with famous Carols through a meeting with ITV News anchorwoman Carol Barnes, whom I'd booked for a different client event. But she wasn't very friendly and much smaller than she looked on TV.
In between times I met a lot of footballers through my brother's connections with Arsenal. I remember being delighted when Wimbledon 'keeper Dave Beasant mistook me for an Arsenal player once. I also remember thinking Gary Neville was a surprisingly nice chap, as were Ian Wright and Dutch football legend Dennis Bergkamp.
Players aside, I was incredibly proud once to spend a whole match analysing play sat next to England coaching legend, Don Howe, but my unassailable Arsenal favorite memory was when I met British pop idols Ant and Dec in the Director's Lounge after a game. I tried really hard to chat 'casually' about the fact we'd both recently been to Japan. Obviously, I had less stories about screaming teenage girls than they had.
After the mid-nineties, I guess I hit a lean spell. I think it was maybe a good five years before I was introduced to the mayor of San Francisco, Willie Brown, who oddly-enough I met while on a date. My date knew him. I never saw her again after that.
And after that came Bill. Good old Bill. So, who do you have in your closet?
Emma and I were honored this evening to be among the first people to be introduced to the twenty-four-hour-old daughter of Anu and Stephanie Datta. 
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