Starting out in showbusiness as a singer in a group with her
brothers Faith Brown gained national fame as an impressionist in TV shows,
notably a frighteningly accurate depiction of Margaret Thatcher.
She was born Irene Monica Carroll on 28th May
1944, the daughter of John Henry, a metal machinist, and his wife Aurita who lived at 12 Olney Street L4. She
was the middle child of five, all her siblings being brothers. She attended St
Francis De Sales school in Walton and after leaving worked in Lewis’ store doing
demonstrations for oven cleaner. Joining brothers Lee, Ron and Mike in a group
called the Carrolls, they enjoyed a fair degree of success. A single, Surrender
Your Love, (listen on YouTube] sold reasonably well and they made a number of TV appearances.
The turning point of her career supposedly came when,
appearing in a club in Preston, her skirt split and to hide her embarrassment
she slipped into an impersonation of Hylda Baker. An agent in the audience was
so impressed that he signed her up and thus began a career of many decades.
She appeared in many top TV shows, including Celebrity
Squares, Give Us A Clue, Blankety Blank, and punchlines. In 1980 she won a TV
Times award as the ‘Funniest Woman on TV’. Her talents stretched across
many fields and she played ‘straight’ roles in Brookside, as Anne
Bradley, and an alien in the Dr Who story Attack of the Cybermen. On
stage she played Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard.
She married musician Len Wady in 1963 and they have one
daughter, Danielle (b.1978).
