My career as the Queen’s lookalike might never have come about if I hadn’t come across an advert in the local paper in 1972. Stuck for ideas for my husband Ken’s birthday, I read about artist Jane Thornhill’s portrait-painting service and thought, “Why not?”
I loved the finished piece, and Jane asked if she could submit it for the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition. They assumed the painting was of the Queen and contacted Buckingham Palace, who said she hadn’t given a sitting. As portraits in the exhibition had to be painted from life, Jane was disqualified.
