ITOLD all my friends and colleagues to watch the local evening news after I was stopped by TV crews on my way to work and asked my opinion on planned improvements to the Brighton Line.

Knowing they would want a mixture of views and in quest for stardom, I perversely told them the line was very much improved already and, apart from the addition of showers on trains, I could not think of how they could better it.

Iwas sure this contrary view would give me at least six seconds of air time between a couple of other commuters complaining about the service and calling for extra trains and more carriages.

But, having told nearly everyone I knew that I would be on the evening news, I was suitably humiliated when the report about planned investment in the rail network failed to include a soundbite from self.

To make matters worse, when the crew stopped me on the concourse and asked if I could spare a few minutes to talk to them, they had also stopped a solicitor from Preston Park at the same time.

In the final edited film, while choosing not to include my words of wisdom, the directors had decided to make use of Preston Park's erudite analysis of the shortcomings of our public transport system compared with various European countries.

While waiting my turn for the camera and thinking myself out of shot, I stood respectfully listening and trying to look encouraging while Preston Park said his piece. Eventually, wishing he was not quite so knowledgeable, I decided to apply lipstick and adjust my hair.

All this I found out later was not in fact out of shot. So, while none of my said friends and family got to see me speak, they all got to see me looking besottedly at Preston Park and smiling and nodding as if I were his wife before tarting myself up for my own moment of glory which never came.

To give Preston Park his due, his comments were worth including and, had I been the editor of the piece, I would have made him my star commuter, despite the distracting presence of a nodding blonde hovering in the background.

But what really completed my humiliation was that the two other commuters whose views we got to hear were no more intelligent than "Yeah, yeah.... I think it's a good idea" and "Well, it's a disgrace isn't it?"

Surely I must have said something of more value than that?

So I spent the day having to endure comments from colleagues such as, "What do you think we should put in the next issue of the magazine? Don't bother answering, just nod and smile when someone else says something worth listening to".

Iwas therefore delighted when the reporter who had conducted the original interviews phoned me at lunchtime to apologise for not including my views and to invite me to take part in a transport debate he was producing for a regional programme in a few weeks' time.

Iwas torn between being flattered into agreeing to take part and the suspicion that the debate already has a full list of speakers but needs to fill out the audience with nodding heads.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.