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Now my favourite pastime is to take a bath with my son.

As a child, I always wanted to be the last one to take a bath because I knew I could close the door and spend hours just having my bath and singing.

My father was a motor mechanic, and my mother a homemaker. We moved to Bath when I was four, and so I consider myself a Bathonian.

As an older dad who grew up in a rural culture in the South, certain things were expected of women, and that included raising the children. But I think it's just as important for the father to give the baths, to hug, to change the diapers, to tell the stories.

Baths are my favorite thing. I can have two, three a day.

My dad had a movie theater so I was there every night.

Growing up in Ireland, when my family received important news, good or bad, we would boil water and make tea. It was the first thing I did when my father died in 1984. This ritual allowed me a moment to take in the enormity of what had happened.

So I rang up my local swimming baths. I said 'Is that the local swimming baths?' He said 'It depends where you're calling from.'

My mother served me wine and water from the time I was 3 years old.