Trying to sell frozen food over the phone for a company called American Frozen Foods. It lasted about half an hour. I found myself telling people not to buy too much of it because it could go bad, and my supervisor said, “This job is probably not for you.”

Working as the assistant to an agony aunt on a women’s magazine. When we didn’t get enough heartbreaking letters, we made them up.

I was a door-to-door carpet-cleaning salesman. I thought my life was going to end, so I binned that after a day.

For two weeks I worked behind the players’ bar at Bolton Wanderers football club – footballers don’t tip.

Helen Mirren was in the elevator with me at the National Theatre. She pressed the button but it didn’t move. I said, “Fancy seeing you here and being stuck in an elevator.” And she said, “Was that meant to be funny?” I apologised, and she laughed. Even talking about it now, it feels so awkward and embarrassing.

Curious, playful and silly.

When I was naive to the complexities of life.

To a resistant materials teacher at secondary school called Mr Noel. He had a comb-over and whenever he turned his back to write on the blackboard, we would roll up bits of paper and launch them at his head. Once, I hit him. I remember him turning around and looking crestfallen.

I don’t think anything scares me. It’s a gift and I want to embrace it.

Finding a tenner in your jeans pocket. It has always been there but you find it at the moment you really need it.