Helene had lived quietly with her husband Alex for the past 20 years, after a career which began as an entertainer on the clubs circuit in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
In 1978 she became a household name as Ida Clough, the militant machinist at Baldwin’s Casuals in Coronation Street. She stayed there for 10 years until 1988, when she was sacked by Mike Baldwin after reporting him for drink driving.
Her son David Palmer, 49, who lives in Buckton, said he never really knew how his mother came to be in The Street. He said: “During her time working the clubs she was with people like Les Dawson, and Freddie Star, also Pat Phoenix (Elsie Tanner), Liz Dawn (Vera Duckworth) and Lynne Perrie (Ivy Tilsley). They were all good friends and she was with them when they all joined Coronation Street around the same time.”
But his mother also had many other acting achievements, among them was appearing in Spend, Spend, Spend – the story of Castleford pools winner Viv Nicholson. She was also in the film Yanks, which starred Richard Gere. The last thing she did was to play the wife of Eric Sykes in an eight part comedy series, Stan The Man.
6 comments:
Thanks for putting this on, I loved the character of Ida Clough, shame she never moved into the street with the rest of the Clough family like Ivy and Vera did with there families, I wonder what Mr Clough was like !!
Helene Palmer made the character very realistic and well remembered.
:( RIP Helene, my heart goes out to all her family and friends during what must be an extremely difficult time for them. The earth has lost a shining star, although there is now one more shining star in the sky.
I quite liked Ida and her run-ins with Ivy and Vera. I can't remember how Ida was written out of the Street or did she just disappear without any explanation?
She left to do Typhoo Tea ads.
Actually, Helene Palmer was a good actress, and her character was far more interesting than the awful Ivy Tilsley.
Helene Palmer was my aunt, she was a lovely lady off screen too. God bless you aunt Helene
Thank you for your comments, my mum loved the time she spent on Coronation Street and would be proud to know she was remembered for her role.......Many thanks..... David Palmer
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