Gardeners' World Christmas Lunch 1990
It was with great sadness that I heard that Andy Meikle died this morning, after a long battle with cancer.
Andy worked for many many years at Pebble Mill, first of all in the drama department on series like Gangsters and then as a director and producer on factual series like On the House and Gardeners’ World.
Andy was an extremely generous, and incredibly practical man – he was brilliant at DIY!
I worked with him on the DIY series On the House , when I joined an established team as a brand new researcher. He taught me a lot about researching for factual television, as well as about working with contributors.
I remember him being really supportive when I directed my first insert on Gardeners’ World in 1990. He said jokily, ‘don’t you hate it when someone can just do it?’ – I certainly hadn’t been able to ‘just do it’, but knowing that he thought I’d done a good job was really important to me, and really helped my confidence.
This photo is from the Christmas lunch for the Gardeners’ World production team from 1990. It includes, left to right: Andy Meikle, Denis Adams, Mark Kershaw, Kulvinder Chudge, Nick Patten, Steph Silk, next might be me (Vanessa Jackson) or Ann Holmes, I can’t see enough of the next two girls to identify, then Patti Evans with the blonde hair, Howard Perks, and Gail Herbert (whose photo it is).
Andy will be much missed, and our thoughts go out to his loved ones.