…Continued (For part one, click here)

The REGiment looked shell shocked. REG modelled the coat, we remembered where we were. We took pictures. The celebs took this opportunity to exit and head to the party, except Chris Evans who bought “the” coat. At least it’ll go with the rest of his wardrobe. I hope he could feel it’s tingle too.

A straggly Q&A ensued, but people wanted autographs and to get to the party, so as Richard Griffiths waxed lyrical about how Handmade Films had been shafted, we all queued for autographs. Paul McGann quotes Danny the drug dealer at me and says “You’re looking very beautiful man”…speechless. Nikki trod on Joan twice in some Freudian driven subconscious act of jealousy and was racked with guilt, so after group harranguing the “get-in-the-back-of-the-van” man, I suggested we go and introduce ourselves to her so she’d know what her poor husband was in for at lunch tomorrow. She was lovely and picked the Aussie instantly, as any self respecting voice coach would! She reminded me of a calm school teacher faced with her excitable ex-pupils. She had to keep a professional distance but was clearly pleased with our achievements. I saw REG look up from signing and smile at this situation. Then we were “entouraged” up the hill, security guards escorting us all past fans and papparazzi to the nightclub. The gorilla from the start of the evening looked at us with renewed interest and asked about the carrots. “If you have to ask, you’ll never know” Touche.

Papparazzi and crowds bustle us. I look up, Paul McGann is smiling at me. Gulp. I look back, there are bunches of carrots, Joan and REG himself following behind me. This is too much. We flash our passes and we’re in the Home nightclub. Up the escalators – huge queue for coat check – fuck that. We elavator up another floor – someone tells me that on any other day, we’d not get within 100 metres of this place. The rest is a blur. We get drinks, it’s noisy, crowded, smokey, we need food. Lots of us down our drinks and escape to MacDonalds. I place my order with Jacki then Nikki and I zoom back to our hotel to dump coats, bags and 510 quids worth of polaroids. Dash back, running the guantlet of people vomiting outside pubs and mafia-like mini cab drivers hustling us for business. This place is insane!! No wonder the MacDonalds here has security guards…who also ask about our carrots.

Once inside, I demand to have some BOOZE! I collect a few wowsers’ miniatures and empty them into my MacDonalds coke cup. The REGiment are horrified and make me hide the empty bottles in Big Mac containers. Now I’m ready to party. Everyone’s spirits are up again. We head back to HOME and start mingling. I might be the drunk Aussie who flirts with all the security gorillas, but it’s Polly who knows how to party. She’s in her element, snogging any bloke that goes past…Kemp brothers, Mcganns…this lass has them all. Right…not to be outdone, I track down the lovely Paul and politely demand a snog. He happily obliges and then asks who’s next! Lordy! He’s blooming gorgeous. Such soft skin. Break my cardinal rule of never appearing in photos standing next to beautiful people. Think I got one with Ralph too. He looked wasted, so did Paul..obviously enjoying the free booze as much as the Aussie. At several points in the evening, business cards were thrust into my hand…interesting. I don’t know what this means, but I think they’re offers of web design. Will have to chase them up when I’m back in front of my computer, but there was obviously some benefit to my standing and displaying myself earlier in the evening. Even Karen got given one by someone thinking she was me. They must have mistaken her Irish brogue for an Aussie drawl. Thank christ for those carrots. What a success they were.

Had to pacify the McGann estrogen brigade at one point when they spot all these girls with carrots lining up to snog their bloke. Understandable. I’m sure we’d be just as irate if they were lining up to snog our REG. They chill out when they discover I’m Dominique, webmistress of the REG Temple and the one who told them about this whole shebang in the first place and got them alerted to early tickets. Hands are shaken, photos taken. Paul realises I’m her too and promises to send me an anonymous email calling REG a wanker. Hilarious. He leaves and they follow. Back on cloud nine again. Spoke to Ralph, his wig was itchy. Told me he lives in Brighton and that he’d meet me at my uncles pub next week. Sure…it’s a date. Now that’s a whole other story!

All the celebs left, so we got down on the floor and boogied. I love a bunch of girls who can dance, and the REGiment were the best. We shimmied all night long, I’m dreading the photos. We snogged the video screen every time REG appeared and I’m sure Neil snogged it when the “get-in-the-back-of-the-van” man did his thing. 3am, kicked out. General silliness all round as we shamble off to our hotels. Jacki and I tried to sleep. Impossible. Take a leaf from Marwoods’ book and don coats over our pyjamas for a Withnailian raid on the hotel vending machines at 5.30 in the morning. All nine floors were visited, giggling like schoolgirls, barefoot and vending in search of a coke machine that worked. At one point a man skulked past us, clutching his coke cans and hurrying away. He realised he could be in danger as we debated whether to mug him or bribe them off him. Too funny. Eventually found one and mini vodka and chocolated our way ’til sunrise. Unforgettable.

Threw things at the breakfast TV shows when they presented the previous evenings event as a showcase for Mrs Beckhams’ hair and outfit…every hour, on the hour. Annoying, but at least we saw REG arriving in the Jag. Didn’t seem real. Poor Jacki must think me mad, because at some point in the morning, I hit “the wall”. I do not function at all well on no sleep. She was showing no signs of flagging…I curled up in a little ball beside the elavators and demanded toast. I was overcome with a pathological need for toast. Why didn’t this godforesaken hotel serve toast?? We burst our way into Nikki and Anne’s bedroom like two eight year olds on a sugar high. They flattened themselves against the wall as we tried unsuccessfully to behave normally. Nikki kidnapped our kettle and we yelled at the man who wanted 8 quid for a bun and tea. We were out of control. I was prepared to buy a toaster. It was clear to me this was the only answer. I was desperate. I NEEDED TOAST!!!!!

Jacki, bless her, steered me down an alley and toast was found. Has toast ever tasted this good? I think not. I was quite delirious and will be forever grateful to the Cornish lass for keeping it all together. We killed time by shopping, then back to the hotel to pack and dress for lunch. Still shaking, nearly vomiting – why oh why didn’t I sleep at some point in the last 48 hours?? Why oh why had I drunk so much? Oh I remember now…because it was freeee! Had to get it together. I was going to meet REG in less than an hour…

Off to the Criterion for lunch. Fuck me it’s posh! We all sit in the front, sheepishly recounting our late night exploits in hushed tones, like choirboys sharing a porn mag in church. Thankfully no one else had slept either. We’d caused mini riots in little pockets all over London by all accounts. The Maitre’d herds us to a table up the back before we cause one here. We struggle with the menu through sleep deprived shakes and foggy eyes.

A paranoid thought hits me. How must REG be feeling? If I was him, the last place I’d want to be, after a night like last night, was here, having lunch with 13 people I don’t know. What if he doesn’t show? Panic over. He shows. 12 on the dot. Arrives looking gorgeous, fresh and glowing. Bastard. He probably got some sleep. Why didn’t I think of doing that? I desperately want to pack the bags under my eyes and slide under the table. Why why why didn’t I sleep? I’ve fucked this whole thing up. He’ll think I’m a fucking zombie, I talk gibberish when I’m sleep deprived. But as his gorgeous bony ass hit his chair, a miracle. I’m cured. Adrenalin reserves kick in and we all transform into 13 of the most charming dinner guests you’ve ever seen. Thank god none of us slept, can you imagine what we’d be like if that adrenalin rush hit 13 healthy, sober, well rested people?

Holy fuck, we’d be bouncing off the walls!

REG was charming. What can I say? He charmed us like no one I’d ever met. He positively radiated charisma. If this was acting, it was the performance of a life time. How could this man organise such an incredible night, do all the publicity and promotion, appear on stage, sign everything, do the auction, look out for his wife, take care of us, go to a nightclub – papparazzi and autograph hounded the whole time – go home to his sick daughter, then wake up the next day, get on a fucking tube and be here at 12 o’clock on the dot for lunch with 13 complete fucking strangers, charming the absolute pants off every one of them? Signing, posing, smiling, talking? How? I could barely turn up to the event, figure out what to wear, scrape myself off the floor and stagger across Leicester Square. This man is a Prince among men. Fuck the fact that he’s gorgeous, or famous, or talented or any of that stuff. Just as a functioning human being, what I was witnessing now was nothing short of a miracle. He went round the table one by one, asking us what we all did and where we were from. Why hadn’t we thought to ask each other these questions??This man knows how to host a dinner party, how to make each and everyone of us feel special and interesting. He gossiped, he joked. He gave me a present. Gobsmacked. I gave him one too, which he took pains to read and be interested in. So grateful.

We played musical chairs and everyone got their chance to pose for a photo and get something signed. I was last. I got a snog, then he signed my husbands’ catalogue “Dear Cameron, just snogged your wife, thanks”. Bahaha! Then he hugged me like he meant it. If any of us were in love with this man before the lunch, we were all 200 times more so after it. Our two perfect hours were up. With a smile and a wave and a discreet credit card to take care of the meal, he vanished. We all turned back to the table and looked blankly at each other.

Stunned.

That was it. Over. Period. Two months of anticipation, excitement, preparation, culminating in the two most incredible days of any of our lives (barring marriages or childbirths) on top of sleep deprivation and adrenalin, could only end one way. Tears.

Withnail for Waterford became Withnail for Waterworks.

I could feel any vain hopes I had of appearing in these people’s lives as a cool, calm, elegant and sophisticated human being were vanishing rapidly as I began blubbing into my hands. I looked up with great relief to see tears streaming down Karen and Carolyn’s faces. Even Neil, the token boy was surruptitiously wiping a tear. We collected our stuff and tumbled out into the street, apologising to the Maitre’d as we left. Hugs and goodbyes as Neil and Carolyn left. Nikki and Polly got pics developed, we all went to Haagen Daas and consumed huge amounts of chocolate ice cream and pancakes. Who knew we could eat so much? Ediena the shrink pointed out how Freudian this was…eating like birds in front of REG, then gorging like pigs when he’d gone. Delicious. My stomach had magically settled.

One by one people left. Tears each time. We’d all made firm and fast friends. So nice to have people to share all this emotion with, who knew exactly how you felt. Dealing with all this on my own would have been unthinkable, and nowhere near as much fun. Eventually and inevitably I was back on that tube by myself. I sat silently and wept the whole way home. Is this what is meant by tears of joy? So happy it went so incredibly well. So sad it was all over. The two emotions cancelled each other out and I just felt numb. I got back to David and Janes. Explained I hadn’t slept a wink since I left there two days ago and I couldn’t remember a thing. Crawled into bed and as I drifted off to glorious sleep, realised I’d just snogged Withnail AND I. With a smile on my face the size of Bruce Robinson’s, I slept and slept and slept.

REG wonders if Richard Griffiths has stolen his carrot.

Paul McGann auditions for The Bill.

Jacki thinks she knows where Paul’s carrot is, and Dominique definitely does!

Dominique thinks Ralph Brown has probably smoked his.

Carolyn smiles happily just thinking of Neils luverly carrots, but Neil is distressed that some of his carrots have been broken.

Karen saw one of Neil’s carrots, it was this big!

Polly, Jacki and Nikki are accused of stealing REG’s carrot

Dominique reunites REG with his carrot and demonstrates how big it is.

Trac, Ediena and Polly are delighted that REG has found his carrot . All’s well that ends well.