Kathy Beale’s EastEnders resurrection ‘feasible’, says Gillian Taylforth

She reappeared for two stints at the turn of the millennium to tie up some storylines before making a brief appearance to mark the show’s 30th anniversary earlier this year.

“But I’ve got nine scripts so far and they’re all fantastic”.

The TV star admitted she cried tears of joy when showrunner Dominic Treadwell-Collins invited her back, and even he wept with the sheer emotion of it.

“Obviously, she was killed off-screen”, Gillian told the Radio Times: “And it’s amusing because a lot of people have always said to me, ‘Why don’t you come back to EastEnders?’ And when I say, ‘I’m dead!’ they always respond, ‘Well, I never saw that!'”. “It will be something feasible”, she said. “I was so shocked that I didn’t”, she explained.

But keeping her return a secret did not go down well with her children, Jessica, 23, and Harrison, 16.

She recalled: ‘On my phone, there was a message from my daughter saying, “Oh God, Mum, is it true you were in it?”

“And then my son texted me: “Thank you, mother”.

Held captive in the vehicle workshop an emotional Kathy begs her ex-husband to let her out.

Kathy is one of the soap’s longest-running characters, having graced the screen since the very first episode, and was originally written out in 1998 when Gillian made a decision to quit.

However, despite the drama around her comeback, many could only focus on the fact that actress Gillian Taylforth, 60, looked considerably younger than her on-screen son Ian Beale, played by 47 year old Adam Woodyatt.

She added: “Yeah, I was wondering about that and he told me a little bit”.

In a new set of pictures, we get a glimpse of a few scenes between her and Phil Mitchell (Steve McFadden). She said: “There might come a time when I think “You know what, I’d better go for that”, but I’m all right for now”.