Len Goodman

Kirsty Young's castaway is the international dance judge, Len Goodman.

He became a star of Strictly Come Dancing and the US show Dancing with the Stars, after a forty year career as a ballroom dancer and judge. Born in London's east end, as a kid he was a barrow-boy, selling fruit and veg on his grandfather's stall. He went on to work on the docks as a welder. But come Saturday night he would don his best threads and head for the Embassy ballroom in Welling.

He was in his sixties when he found international fame and it was, he says, perfect timing. "If it had happened when I was thirty, I'd have been one these people that would be seen rolling out of nightclubs drunk, with a couple of dolly-birds on my arm. The pilot was on my sixtieth birthday and I think it was the perfect age because I was sensible by then, my feet were planted firmly on the ground."

Producer: Leanne Buckle.