When you're talking about Bradford theatrical people called Pat, don't forget Pat Pilkington," said Eileen Black, ringing in response to an item in which I'd mentioned Pat Kirkwood and Pat Paterson.

And she added that by coincidence the landlady Pat Paterson used to lodge with when she was appearing in Bradford was called Mrs Pilkington, whose premises were at the top of Triangle Street, which ran from Bowling Old Lane to the bottom of Manchester Road.

By a further coincidence the Pat Pilkington in question also lodged there. She was the Manchester-born actress who went on to be best known to the nation as Coronation Street's Elsie Tanner, acting under the name of Pat Phoenix. And as Mrs Black reminded me, she married her first husband in Bradford.

Pat Pilkington first appeared in the city professionally in June, 1953, when she joined the Harry Hanson Court Players at the Prince's Theatre. She wasn't new to West Yorkshire, though, having been a member of the Lawrence Williamson Repertory in Keighley and also worked with a repertory company in Halifax.

In September the T&A was able to report that Patricia and fellow actor Peter Marsh, who were appearing together that week in the Court Players' production of Sarah Ann Holds Fast, were to marry at Bradford Cathedral on September 19. She was 26, and had already attracted quite a big following.

Newspaper reports said the Cathedral was packed with hundreds of fans and friends. Among them was milliner Mildred Robinson, of Gaisby Lane, who had been asked to make the head-dress for the wedding and went on to recall the occasion to a reporter 20 years ago, after Pat Phoenix's death from lung cancer in September, 1986.

She said the actress had invited her and dressmaker Elsie Marsden to join the couple and their close friends at their reception - a buffet lunch in the tiny room occupied by the actress.

"She was such a kind and generous person that she wanted everyone to go back, even us," she added. Mildred recalled, of their first meeting: "She wasn't as flamboyant a person then as she later got to be. She was very slim and attractive but the thing I remember most was that she had the most marvellous hair -a lovely red auburn colour."

By August of the following year the T&A was reporting Pat's decision to leave the Harry Hanson company, citing the strain of appearing twice nightly following a recent illness. She returned though, on several occasions, to appear at the Alhambra after finding national fame with Coronation Street.

It was on one of those occasions that she met a woman who, in her letter to the T&A after Pat's death identified herself simply as "Pigtails". We had carried a piece which referred to the time Pat and her fellow thespians drinking in the old Majestic Vaults and Little Alex pubs.

Pigtails wrote: "Being a little younger than that group of pals, I was among the next gang to gather at those bars. So I never met Pat Pilkingon in her Bradford days. But I did meet Elsie Tanner. I couldn't believe my eyes when she walked into the Little Alex one night with a minder' appointed to help her manage her affairs.

"I must have thought she was going to vanish at any moment. So I rushed over to ask for her autograph. Before she had a chance to speak I was told abruptly by the minder' NOT to bother Miss Phoenix. Then Miss Phoenix just as abruptly told him never to do that again. She made me feel six feet tall.

"Ordinary little me was just as important as her real reason for being there; for she then marched up to the bar and said: I've come back for one of those meat pies I used to enjoy so much.' Never mind Elsie Tanner - at last I'd met Pat Pilkington."

l Back to Pat Paterson, who as reported here the other week appeared at the Alhambra as a Sunbeam in Francis Laidler's pantomimes. So too did Doris Graham, mother of Joan S Moorhouse, who tells me that Doris (one of 11 children) was a Sunbeam on two occasions.

"The first was in 1924-25 at Leeds (where, of course, the Sunbeams had to live together with an auntie') and the following season she was invited to audition for the 1925-26 Babes in the Wood in Bradford - which must be the one referred to in the Pat Paterson article. Over the years Mum talked about Pat Paterson and Charles Boyer."

She also talked about how she used to walk down from her home in West Bowling to the Alhambra on her own at the age of 13 or 14 and how one of her brothers would walk down to escort her back after the show - in which the principal boy was played by Gladys Stanley, later to become Mrs Laidler.

Doris Graham's Leeds experience as a Sunbeam must have stood her in good stead when it came to seeking a place in the Bradford panto the following year. A note from Francis Laidler's office at the Alhambra dated October 5, 1925, says: "Mr Laidler is advertising for Sunbeams and is asking them to come on Saturday morning next on the stage at the Bradford Prince's Theatre, but he could see you on Friday evening at 7pm in the Bradford Prince's Theatre Rehearsal Room."

Mrs Moorhouse says: "I grew up with Mum's tales of how it introduced her to completely different world from the one she knew. She always described it as living a dream in fairyland'."