This morning it was confirmed that Patsy Palmer will soon be back on our screens.
The former soap actress, best known for playing Bianca Jackson in BBC's EastEnders and Natasha in the children's drama series Grange Hill, was the first contestant revealed in the line up for ITV's Dancing on Ice. The show, hosted by Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield is set to return around January 2023 as the celebrity participants strut their stuff on the ice.
Patsy Palmer first turned up on Albert Square back in 1993 and it was a real tipping point for the young actress who had spent many years addicted to drink and drugs. After several stints on the BBC One soap - between 1993–1999, 2008–2014 and 2019 - Patsy is now running her Commonwealth Lifestyle Foundation while living a happy family life in California, reported Wales Online.
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But back in the early 1990s the then-mother-of-one was living in a tiny damp flat in London’s East End and the star once bravely admitted that her life revolved around alcohol and drugs. In her autobiography All Of Me, she wrote: "By my 20s I was bingeing my life away on cocaine, ecstasy, and enough vodka and Laurent Perrier Champagne to quench a small village's thirst for several hours.
"I would be out of my head for two or three days in a row - whole chunks of time were lost. I took so many drugs I'm amazed I survived."
Her first marriage to filmmaker Nick Love in the summer of 1998 lasted just five months. It wasn't until she entered rehab in September 2004 that she finally got clean, according to MirrorOnline.
Her second marriage, to London taxi driver Richard Merkell in 2000, provided the stability she needed that set her on the road to sobriety. She once told Mirror Online: "We don't have drink in our house.
"Richard is a social drinker but he doesn't drink at home. I follow the 12-step programme from Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous."
And in 2014 she turned her back on the BBC1 show and Blighty for life by the beach in Malibu, California. Now, her fabulous life is unrecognisable from the dark days she fought so hard to leave behind.
Patsy, 50, Richard, and their children, Fenton, 22, Emilia, 21, and Bertie, 11, enjoy an idyllic life in a sprawling pad by the sea. The lavish mansion boats uninterrupted views out across the ocean and features a modern, neutral finish throughout.
One room houses Patsy's personal passion - her DJ decks, while the children are all home-schooled in the lavish home to free up time for them to focus on their own acting and modelling careers.
Patsy previously told i-D magazine: "They don't really like school anyway, I hated it when I was a kid, so I'm never going to push them. They're very creative - I feel like there's a lot more they could be doing outside of school, anyway."
The actress is all about female empowerment and founded the Commonwealth Lifestyle Foundation which helps women make business and personal connections while raising money for charity.
She counts Meg Matthews, Cindy Crawford and Camille Grammer among her closest friends and can often be found hanging with the A-list at private members' club Soho House.
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