At My Mother's Knee...And Other Low Joints: Tales from Paul’s mischievous young years

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The young Liverpool entertainer, an altar boy from Irish Catholic Birkenhead, becomes the acid-tongued and outrageous drag queen Lily Savage, and moves from gay pubs to national television, creating something of a British comic institution en route (O'Grady's caustic drag character was a world away from safer predecessors such as Danny La Rue). I read this when it first came out when I was a lot younger because I loved him off the telly since I was a small child! What I didn't realise at the time was that he has so much to tell that I think he is already on book 4 of his life.

I wanted to read his whole story, I admire and respect the important work he does now, especially with my love of animals, and the part of his life story I read was okay, but not his life story. He also appeared in the comedy sitcom Eyes Down (2003–2004) and presented several travel documentaries. Now I release his autobiographies are four books, so far, a good money earning business, his first 18 years took 352 pages, yes agreed a busy young life, but I was let down after this first autobiography.

I enjoyed this first instalment of his life story, it's written in an almost conversational, rambling style with the author going off at lots of interesting tangents.

I found it interesting to find out about life in Birkenhead for Paul O'Grady, as it's an area I know. News from Nowhere will not obtain personal information from other organisations, and will not share, pass on or sell personal information that we hold about individuals to anyone else. Paul O'Grady first came to fame in the guise of Lily Savage, and was nominated for a Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Festival in 1991.I have been a fan of Paul O'Grady for a long time, I think he's fantastic and funny without even trying to be. He tells it as it was, rather than in his TV voice - and I like the TV voice so it just didn't make me want to carry on. I only read it whilst a member of a reading group - the premise of the group being that members were encouraged to read books they might ordinarily never consider reading - thanks reading group! In parts laugh-out-loud funny but also at times very poignant, this is a marvellous evocation of a Catholic working class upbringing in the 1950s through to the mid-70s. It was whilst living in London in 1978 that he first turned his hand to drag, developing the character of Lily Savage based upon various female relatives of his.

This particular book covers his early life and his first jobs prior to entering the entertainment world and rather than been full of famous people with anecdotes it is loaded with humorous unknown characters that would easily fit in a Tom Sharpe novel.

Now, in his own unique voice, Paul O'Grady tells story of his "early" life in Irish Catholic Birkenhead that started him on the long and winding road from mischievous altar boy to national treasure.