Ben Elton: ‘I fancied Olivia Newton-John. It’s all right to say that about a third cousin, right?’

‘I’d be friends with the Wiggles even if I wasn’t on their payroll’ … Ben Elton. Photograph: David Levene/The Guardian

Of all the things you’ve written, what gets quoted at you the most?

It’d be something from my three series of Blackadder. That’s the one that really entered the culture. I think the thing I’m proudest of is how both The Young Ones and Blackadder genuinely seeped into language. It’s not so much quotes you hear but people using the rhythms of it – like: “You’re as small as a very small thing that’s got a degree in being small.”