Shirley Hughes

This evening I went to the Egmont Authors and Illustrators' Party at the London Transport Museum, Covent Garden. I walked back to the Tube Station with Shirley Hughes, who I'd spent the last hour plucking up the courage to speak to, but she was surrounded by people most of the time. She was collecting her amazing bright pink coat and dapper hat from the cloak room at the same time as me, and we walked to Covent Garden tube together. She told me about a talk her daughter once gave about her new Christmas story - to a class full of Jewish schoolchildren! - and I told her she was one of the reasons I ended up being an illustrator; her books filled the house through all three of our childhoods. I did get a bit starstruck. She's 81. I hope I look and sound as good as her - and am still drawing - when I'm her age!