The death of Dame Barbara Windsor has been announced; the star of Carry On films and soap opera EastEnders had been suffering from Alzheimer's. Born Barbara-Ann Deeks in London, she had her heart set on showbusiness from an early age, and was accepted by stage school, graduating to the chorus line and gaining increasingly substantial roles in the theatre from then on. She made a virtue of her Cockney accent, and in musical Fings Ain't Wot They Used to Be she became a star.
Film roles followed: her breakthrough was Sparrows Can't Sing, which got her noticed by Carry On producer Peter Rogers, and she went on to appear in nine of the long-running series, including Carry On Spying, Carry On Doctor, Carry On Camping and Carry On Henry. Other roles included Crooks in Cloisters, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, The Boy Friend and latterly, the Pet Shop Boys' It Couldn't Happen here and the 2010s Alice in Wonderland movies. She was popular on television, too, memorable in Worzel Gummidge as Saucy Nancy and with guest parts in anything from Filthy, Rich and Catflap to Norbert Smith, A Life, but it was EastEnders that defined her on the small screen as pub landlady Peggy Mitchell, proving her range as adept at the drama as she was at the laughs.
