Group Editor Andrew Palmer surrenders an afternoon to Ambridge and emerges knowing far too much about yoghurt.

Spoiler alert: this was a fabulous Sunday afternoon spent in the company of the people we are all, frankly, obsessed with. By "we" I mean an audience who could recite the Grundy family tree back to the Domesday Book and tell you precisely what Lynda Snell said to Robert over the hollyhocks in 1998, but who might struggle to name their own MP.

I had expected a certain demographic, and it duly turned up. What I hadn't expected was the younger contingent, rather less stuffy than the stereotype would have it. There were parents bringing children and, rather touchingly, children bringing parents. It wasn't quite a sea of Barbour jackets and wellies, though I'd wager a few were waiting in the boot.

Seventy-five years on from that first broadcast in 1951, the world's longest-running radio drama has plainly not lost its grip.

What followed was two hours of pure entertainment. It was interactive and immersive, and funnier than any afternoon billed as a celebration of rural life has a right to be.

First prize for the compère

If there were a rosette for compering, Angela Barnes would have carried it off, along with the Victoria sponge, the largest marrow and the dahlia cup for good measure.

Barnes is not one of those hosts who has skimmed the Wikipedia page in the taxi. She is the genuine article, a fan's fan who knows her Aldridges from her Horrobins, and she was visibly having the time of her life. Her timing was immaculate and her asides beautifully judged. She steered the afternoon with the warmth of a landlady at The Bull and the steely authority of Lynda Snell with a clipboard. When a story threatened to meander, she reeled it in; when the audience wanted more, she gave them rope.

She had warned us, to be fair. "I am not just an Archers superfan, I am obsessed with all things Ambridge," she has said of the tour. Being asked to host, she added, was "like winning a prize at the Flower and Produce Show and being cast as the lead in a Lynda Snell production, all rolled into one." On this showing, she deserved both, and possibly a speaking part.

Legends, with a dash of luvvie

Harrogate got the tour's "Produce Cast": Charles Collingwood (Brian Aldridge), Ryan Kelly (Jazzer McCreary), Susie Riddell (Tracy Horrobin) and Sunny Ormonde (Lilian Bellamy).

With that laugh, Ormonde is the Barbara Windsor of Ambridge, and we were duly treated to that distinctive laugh, which is to Lilian what the gin is to Lilian: essential. Collingwood, meanwhile, has been playing Brian for 51 and a half years, which is longer than most marriages, all mortgages and every diet I have ever attempted.

They are legends in their own right, with anecdotes that are genuinely fascinating, even if there is a touch of the luvvie about them. Nobody minded in the slightest. Collingwood recalled once being accused of being "relentlessly anecdotal".

If it was meant as a criticism, it missed its mark entirely, because relentless anecdotes were exactly what we had come for. Before the tour he had promised "a show full of fun, laughter and surprises", and admitted that Brian himself would never go on tour, finding it "a distraction from the ongoing problems at Home Farm". Brian's loss.

The ironing board of destiny

The revelation of the afternoon, though, came from a voice we have never heard and yet hear six times a week. Vanessa Nuttall, the programme's studio manager and live sound-effects wizard, pulled back the curtain on how Ambridge is made, and brought the house down doing it.

"Ness", as we were all calling her by the interval, described the work as a "tapestry of sound". We learned that the gates of Ambridge are, in fact, a very old ironing board, which rather ruins every country walk I have ever pictured. There was also a disclosure about how the steamy scenes are achieved, which I shan't repeat in a family publication, save to say that romance on Radio 4 is considerably less glamorous than the listener imagines.

Her favourite prop, however, is yoghurt. Yes, yoghurt. You will have to go to find out why, and I promise you will never look at a Müller Corner in quite the same way again. Ness even handed out a script and reminded us of the real joy of audio drama, which is that the listener's imagination does half the work.

Pub quiz rules

The whole thing is dressed up as Ambridge's Flower and Produce Show, give or take a marquee, and the audience is very much part of the exhibit. Via an app we answered questions and posed our own. The pub quiz, which could have been lifted from a Tuesday night at The Bull, had a hall full of grown adults competing with the ferocity of Joe Grundy guarding a ferret.

For the finale, the four actors performed a sketch penned for the tour and set at the Produce Show, aided by Ness on sound and Angela in the thick of it. Every footstep, creak and clink was conjured in front of us. It was a lovely demonstration of the craft, and a reminder that the magic works just as well when you can see the wires.

There was so much variety and interaction that the two hours passed faster than a Shula storyline is forgotten. Die-hards will relish the gossip; the Archers-curious will leave wondering why they waited so long to tune in.

Seventy-five years on, Ambridge still knows how to put on a show. Here's to the next seventy-five, and to whoever first thought of doing that with a yoghurt.



For theatre dates today, 28th September, Liverpool Philharmonic Hall and 6 October, Tyne Theatre & Opera House, Newcastle for other dates click here