I don't like feeling vulnerable. I think my mum and dad's divorce affected me more than I let on.
I try to live my life free of regrets, but I do have one style regret that makes me laugh and cringe at the same time. Mum used to dress my brother and me in bright neon bike pants and big baggy t-shirts that were so long you could barely see our bike pants.
My overwhelming memory of being a child is the huge amount of love I felt for my mum. She was my everything, because she was both my mum and my dad.
I used to sing Chaka Khan tunes in the car with my mum when I was eight years old.
Mum was the matriarch and the patriarch of the family.
I've got a really great family round me, two sisters and an older brother and my mum and dad. Everybody's equal.
Up until the age of 12, I went to dog shows every weekend. Mum showed beagles. It's a really competitive and eclectic world filled with characters who wear interesting outfits - similar to 'Toddlers & Tiaras,' but with dogs.
I love being a mum but I do love to work too.
The kids think we're wacky. Mum and Dad are in showbiz - they don't know any other way. They've grown up travelling all over the world and are getting a worldly education. My son is 12 and he can speak eloquently on religions and cultures.
I was so sure I wanted to be a novelist. I would spend hours and hours every day writing. Little stories about nothing in particular. I recall one about someone with an illness. But my dedication wasn't really healthy, and it reached the point where I wasn't sleeping. My mum would tell me, 'You need to go outside to get some fresh air.'
Mum put me in drama classes when I was about 14. I'd been going on about it for some time, so maybe it was a way to shut me up.
There are absolutely no problems between me, my dad and my sister. Obviously I grew up with just my mum, but my relationship with my dad is just fine.
I always imagined a writer was someone who lived in an attic in Paris, but my mum instilled in me a belief that I could do anything - so I ended up writing my first novel while working nights as a news reporter.
My dad lived till he was 78, my mum was in her 80s, and I've got two uncles who are in their 90s now.
A coach told my mum I had talent and I would make a very good skater.
Every year since I was very small, my family - Mum, Dad, sister Charlie-Ann and brother Stephen - and I have been holidaying in Carvoeiro in the Algarve, so that has very fond memories for me.
I remember clearly watching a 'Sooty Show' at a theatre and telling my mum I wanted to be up with the puppets, not in the audience.
I had the best of both worlds when I was a kid. I'd spend a quiet week with my mum, then I'd go to my dad's property in the Adelaide Hills, where there were all these kids and animals running around.
My mum always told me 95 per cent of success was partnering well.
But in this case, he had my cell phone and my phone was ringing and I had just come back from Australia on the plane and I thought it was my mum and it was Woody Allen just checking to see if I wanted to be in his movie.
I would ask my mum to feed my dolls and make sure they were tucked in when I went to school.
'To Kill A Mockingbird' is one of my favourite novels, my mum brought me up reading it, and it never fails to move me.
I loved theatre and film when I was growing up in Harpenden, Hertfordshire. My mum's a reflexologist and my dad's a corporate financier.
I think every mother feels that the best place for their child is with their mum, but you want things for yourself, too. So, you're either at work feeling guilty, or you are at home feeling frustrated.
My mum is a bit unconventional; she's outdoorsy and has more of an emotional intelligence, whereas my dad is pragmatic; he's a businessman.
My sister died and my mum was really distant, as you do - you don't expect your offspring to die before you. I thought I was bulletproof up until that stage.
And my parents' separation was tricky. But my mum had always been really honest with me, and treated me like an adult even when I was really young, so I knew they hadn't been getting on.
I started playing piano age six. I was also singing in the choir, so my mum put me into music school. I went to study there for seven years, but it was not my passion. I quit because I wanted to study marketing. But I can still play piano.
I had my footballing heroes such as Bryan Robson and Diego Maradona but my dad was a rugby league star, and he was my real hero. But the relationship with my mum was rocky and we saw things that would affect any youngster.
For four years, my mum allowed only church music in the house.
If you ask anyone who my mum's blue-eyed boy is, they will say it is me.
I love being in London, where I live, for the shops, the bars and the clubs - but I equally enjoy going to my mum's house in Ayrshire and being able to sit on a cliff by the sea.
I have never been insecure, ever, about how I look, about what I want to do with myself. My mum told me to only ever do things for myself, not for others.
One day Mum saved up for this exciting new thing - a frozen chicken. She cooked it on the Sunday and we all sat around waiting for it, but there was a terrible smell from the kitchen. She didn't realise that the giblets were in a plastic bag inside it. We just ate vegetables and she cried and cried.
My mum and dad had worked incredibly hard to afford me an education.
My mum was Labour-voting, but wanted us to know we were important. Basically, everyone's equal, but you, my children, are a bit better.