Actress Patsy Kensit has said she has never gotten over the death of her mother, Leitrim-born Margaret-Rose, and has described her as "an angel" and "the best mum."
Appearing on Friday night's Late Late Show on RTÉ One, Kensit spoke about her connections to Ireland and her love for her late mother, who passed away after a long battle with cancer at the age of 46 in 1993.
"My mum was diagnosed with cancer when I was four and that was in the seventies and it was a death sentence," Kensit said.
"I remember between the age of five and 13 going to hospital to say goodbye to her half a dozen times and then she’d just pull through. She had great optimism, whereas I’m more glass half empty."
She added, "I can be a pessimist but I have a happy soul. I’ve had a great life. I’ve had to be very strong. I was on a crusade when I was a kid - 'if I can make money then we can get a council house, then I can buy that for my mum, I can buy her health care . . . ‘
"She lived with the illness for 25 years. I had to say goodbye to this angel. I’ve never gotten over it and I’m just sad that my sons didn’t have her around as a grandmother because she was the best mum."
58-yer-old Londoner Kensit has starred in films with Roger Moore, Robert Redford, David Bowie and Mel Gibson and more recently appeared in ITV soap opera Emmerdale, BBC One medical drama Holby City, and EastEnders.
Kensit, who has two children, including her son Lennon with former husband, Liam Gallagher of Oasis, lived in Killiney in Dublin with her second husband, Simple Minds front man Jim Kerr, in the mid-nineties.
"I always get an ego boost when I come to Dublin, people are always shouting out to me," she said. "Whenever I feel down, I get out of London and come here.
"We knew all about our Irish roots when we were growing up. I was confirmed, I had my first communion, I went to a convent school. I am an à la carte catholic, however - I only take the bits that work for me and bits of other things that work for me."
Kensit started her career at the very young age of four when she appeared in The Great Gatsby with Robert Redford and Mia Farrow.
"I remember so much about that," she said. "I came from a very poor background; we lived in two rooms with an outside toilet until I was 11. I’d come out of our house and be driven to Pinewood Studios in a Rolls Royce.
"There was all this glamour and beautiful people and this blond man would walk on set and all the women would giggle and my mum would get all flushed and obviously it was Robert Redford.
"Then I would go home to our two rooms and peeing outside in the middle of the night. Hahahaha."
She also spoke about how Elizabeth Taylor took her under her wing when they were making the 1976 film The Blue Bird, which was shot on location in Moscow and Leningrad.
"Being a child actor herself, she had a great patience and understanding about what it’s like to be on set when you are very little. She took me under her wing and became friends with my mum.
"She had just got divorced from Richard Burton and to make a telephone call out of Russia in those days, you had to book it in advance. She would come down to my mum and say ‘I have a call’ and we knew it was with Richard and we had to vacate our suite. Her and Burton reunited after that film.
"She was playful, she was professional and I never saw her have a diva fit. She was wonderful and made a very great impression on me."
You can watch the Late Late Show on the RTÉ Player
