Me Life Story

by Scarlett Moffatt

  I was so happy when I got to my healthy BMI range and I must admit I actually enjoy doing the exercises. My family and friends said they got the old energetic five-foot pint-sized pocket rocket back. However, of course some people aren’t happy. I had gone from getting trolled and slagged in the press for being overweight and a bad role model to now being ‘too skinny’ and being a bad role model. People were saying they liked the old Scarlett better (I mean I still have the same brain, thoughts and feelings, there’s just less of me to squeeze into a jumpsuit).

  I do not agree with body shaming. Whether it’s for someone who’s little or large, it is not OK. We need to get out of this mentality that we have the right to judge people. We do not. When we say awful things about the way someone else looks it says more about us than them. This is a very clichéd lesson I learnt but it’s one I feel is really important in life, especially now because of social media and how easy it is to make a nasty comment about someone. It goes like this:

  ‘If you can’t say something nice,

  don’t say anything at all.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  LET ’S GET READY TO JUNGLE

  Myleene Klass’s iconic white bikini from that infamous shower scene in I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! sold for £7,500 at auction in 2006 – the fashion designer gave the proceeds to charity.

  Medic Bob is so popular on the German version of I’m a Celeb that he’s had a hit single released based on the stuff he’s said on screen.

  The Australian coat of arms features two native animals, an emu and a kangaroo. Both of them can only move forward, which represents the notion that the country is never going backwards. (I mean they’re also one of the only countries to eat both the animals on their coat of arms – but that is none of my business.)

  ‘I’m a celebrity … get me out of here!’ Ant and Dec boomed from the top of the camp. Perched on the corner of my couch at home, fire on full blast and unicorn slippers on, I said, ‘Let’s order a chicken kebab and have a glass of Baileys, eh?’ I was always trying to entice my mam and dad into making a big thing of the first ever episode of the jungle every year. We all loved it, from trying to guess which celebrities were going to be in the opening title sequence to making our predictions of who was going to be crowned King (or Queen) of the Jungle that year. It has and always will be my favourite TV show. I love it more than Red Dwarf, Bottom, The Young Ones – even more than The Royle Family. It is my guilty pleasure and I look forward to it every year.

  In the Moffatt household when the winner is announced and whisked off to that infamous jungle throne, it’s a clear indication that we need to finish off the bulk of our Christmas shopping. The other human advent calendar in the Moffatt household is Michael Bublé. He randomly pops up shortly after I’m a Celebrity ends and you just know when Buble starts popping up singing swing hits, you should have all your Christmas presents wrapped and ready under the tree. Yep, November and December is definitely my favourite time of the year: Christmas decorations, selection boxes from the pound shop, you can wear as many layers of clothing as you like so you don’t feel so guilty about having that extra roast potato or two … and, of course, I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!

  I had watched the show every year since it began in 2002. I remember going into dance class when we would be practising for the Christmas dance medal test and chatting about who we wanted to win and all the gruesome tasks they had been given. I was such a huge fan, a super fan. My absolute heroes were Ant and Dec. I loved hearing my accent on the television and just thought, imagine having Ant and Dec’s job. They get to spend every day with their best friend and they always have such a good laugh. I knew I’m a Celebrity inside out.

  I remember the first ever series I watched. I was twelve and a female comedian called Rhona Cameron went on a huge ‘sometimes’ rant and started slagging all of her camp mates off. ‘Sometimes Uri Geller dramatises little things like farts like he’s an alien who’s never seen one before.’ Me and my mam and dad burst into a fit of laughter. From that moment I knew I was going to be hooked on that show. My favourite ever camp mate was Peter Andre, especially in the shower scenes with his six-pack. I don’t think I had Sky Plus then so I couldn’t rewind or freeze-frame it, so I just used my photographic memory. (That reminds me, I haven’t thought about Peter’s six-pack in a while – I must have a long hard think about that later.)

  But my favourite ever moment from the jungle was when Gillian McKeith pretended to faint and pulled her T-shirt down. She was a funny one, mind, always saying no to doing a simple trial like sticking your feet in mealworms – yet she smelt people’s shite for a living! How can you say ‘I’m a celebrity, get me out of here’ when you sniff people’s faeces as your job? You would think nothing would have fazed her. (To be honest, that show she did never made sense to me. It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to work out that if you take a dump in a Tupperware box and get someone to sniff it, they’re gonna say it stinks. Of course it bloody does, it’s crap in a box!)

  So imagine my delight when Daisy, Micky and Richard at ITV first approached me to ask me to go for a meeting about possibly being a camp mate on I’m a Celebrity. I could not believe it. But my initial reaction was: ‘Well, first of all it’s called I’m a Celebrity, and I’m not a celebrity. I know you’ve had what some people would class as D-listers on before, but I’m not even a Z-lister. Come to think of it, I am not even in the bloody alphabet. You can get someone better than me, honestly.’ I was not selling myself at all.

  But the producers were just chatting about what I would bring to the jungle. I was like, ‘Well, I cannot really clean and I cannot cook. I hate camping. I probably would cry at every challenge. I don’t really like adventurous food; the craziest, most alternative thing I’ve ever eaten is quinoa. The only thing I could bring and offer to the table is morale. I can try and keep morale up, I can always offer some daft jokes and I can talk about rubbish all day long, but other than that I don’t really know what I can offer.’

  They said they would be in touch and a couple of months later I got the call from Micky and Daisy. (It’s that secretive that each celebrity gets given a code name. My code name was ‘Little’.)

  ‘Hi Little, how are you?’

  ‘I’m really good, you two. How are you both?’

  ‘Amazing, thanks. We are just calling to say we would love you to join the I’m a Celebrity gang and be one of the camp mates this year!’

  ‘Oh my God, this is crazy. I’m actually going to be on the show? In real life? In actual real life?’

  ‘That’s right. What do you think?’

  ‘Of course, it’s a huge yes. I can’t wait to be a camp mate. Ahh, I can’t wait to get my hat and my red gilet with my name and number on the back!’

  I was so excited and knew I had to take this amazing dream opportunity but I was equally as nervous. I had never been away from all my loved ones for that long before. I also knew what a wimp I am and in the back of my mind I was thinking, oh God, what happens if there’s a challenge I can’t do? I don’t want to let all my friends and family down and embarrass them.

  It was bizarre, I couldn’t tell anybody even though I wanted to scream it from the rooftop. I wanted to parade through my home town of Bishop Auckland with a huge banner saying, ‘I’m going in the jungle, I won’t let the side down, town’. There was only the fantastic five of my mam, dad, Ava, my auntie Kirsty and my boyfriend Luke who knew I was going into the Outback of Australia.

  When I told my mam, she was like, ‘Please don’t embarrass yourself.’ It wasn’t even like, ‘Yeah, this is amazing.’ It was, ‘Oh please, for the love of God, don’t embarrass yourself. I know you’re scared of everything, but just try, just try not to be a Helen Flanagan. Don’t be saying, “I’m not doing it”, or “I’m a celebrity, get me out of here”.’ (Mothers, eh?)

  I tried to spend as much time with my mother and my family and friends as I could, knowing I’d be away from them for a c
ouple of months – which for someone who doesn’t really leave her home town is a huge thing.

  Because I knew I was flying out on Guy Fawkes’ Night I decided to have a big get-together on my birthday, 17 October. ‘Thank you all for coming, I’m really going to miss you all. Just know I love you all no matter what,’ I announced to everyone after a few drinks.

  ‘Why are you going to miss us, Dafty?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just feel like now we’ve got older we hardly see each other. I know with it being Christmas it’s extra busy so I’m going to miss you.’

  ‘Oh yeah, this hasn’t got anything to do with your name being in the papers as one of the people who might be going into the jungle, has it?’

  ‘That’s stupid, isn’t it? I bloody wish.’

  And all the while I wanted to scream, ‘Its true, I’m going into the jungle!’

  Seven whole months I had to keep it to myself and the fantastic five. I agreed to do the jungle in April and honestly the time just flew by. I had my radio job and I was filming Gogglebox just a week before I flew out.

  Imagine the excitement inside of my brain when 5th November crept up. I had had seven whole months of day-dreaming about what I’d get up to in the jungle and now it was about to happen. I knew I had to embrace every single minute of it; I didn’t expect to stay in there long because, well, for one thing, I wasn’t a proper celeb and two, I just watched TV for a living. I knew compared to who was going to be in there I was a nobody. I thought no one is going to vote for little me. So thinking I would be out within a week, I packed my suitcase full of casual stuff – packed to the brim it was, as I knew I’d have loads of time to chill by the pool.

  When I finally got to Australia, I felt so weird. Even though I had known I was going for such a long time and I had tried to prepare myself, it did not feel real at all. The day I arrived I just wanted to get in there; I couldn’t believe it was happening plus I didn’t want ITV to change their minds. As far as I was concerned, the quicker I got in there the better, then they couldn’t ditch me.

  For the first week of being in Australia, though, you just chill in your hotel room. You are allowed out around the hotel, but you’ve got to have a chaperone so that you don’t bump into anyone else on the show (I felt like I was in MI5, it was amazing). So you really honestly don’t know who else is going to be in that camp with you as you aren’t even allowed your phone or wi-fi to check. That’s why when people are saying they miss their families and it’s only been a week in the jungle, in actual fact they haven’t spoken to their families for a fortnight.

  Just two days before I went into the jungle, I found out on an Australian news channel that Donald Trump was now the US President. I remember thinking about this a lot in camp; I would just be sitting in my hammock so many times thinking, ‘God, what world am I going to come out to? Will there even be a world there? I don’t know if this show is even being televised any more. Has he stopped all the TV stations? Is he just broadcasting himself twenty-four hours a day?’ It was really frustrating just not even knowing what was going on out there.

  Eventually the day arrived, D-Day, and we had a quick last-minute meeting about the dos and don’ts of the jungle, which were all pretty much common sense. They asked if I had any questions. I only had one.

  ‘I really don’t want to say the C-word on the show.’

  ‘No, you cannot say the C-word.’

  ‘So what do I say instead?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I would never say that C-word on TV, the one that rhymes with “runt”. I mean “celebrity”. If I can’t do a trial, what do I say? Because, well, I can’t say, “I’m a celebrity, get me out of here.” I just can’t. I’ll have to say, “I’m sometimes on the telly, get me out of here,” because the thought of saying the word “celebrity” absolutely makes me cringe.’

  ‘Haha, don’t worry, I am sure when you are covered in a hundred thousand bugs you will soon be able to say the C-word, believe me.’

  I was ready for my dream to come true. I knew that in a few hours’ time I was going to meet Ant and Dec. I was blindfolded and put some headphones on. ‘OK, Scarlett, when we take the headphones and blindfold off, you are going to walk around the corner where you will be greeted by Ant and Dec.’

  ‘Thank you. I hope I make it. My legs feel like jelly.’

  I had so many thoughts going through my mind. There had been lots of speculation about who was going into the jungle that year. The papers back at home were saying it was going to be Nigel Farage. Oooh, I didn’t know if I could stay if he was in there, I thought, because I’d want to push him in the camp fire. I was so nervous about who my camp mates might be. I don’t know why but I was convinced the Chuckle Brothers were going to be in there. Imagine the trials (‘to me, to you’).

  The blindfold was off. The headphones were off. It was happening. I walked round and lived my fantasy. My two hundred bonds of hair extensions were blowing in the breeze, I could feel one of my eyelashes coming off, I had now realised my spray tan looked patchy in the sunlight, I had my £40 white and gold kimono dress on and gold heels that I couldn’t walk properly in (Bambi on ice) but they looked good so it was all fine. Despite all this and having a sweaty tash, I could see my heroes in the flesh. It finally felt real, I was going on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!

  ‘Oh my God, I’m going to meet the real Ant and Dec!’ I was saying in my head. I held back the tears of excitement that threatened to come from being face to face with them. Think of something cool to say, I kept whispering to myself. ‘Oh my God, it’s really you, Wonkey Donkey was the highlight of my week as a kid!’ I blurted out. (Smooth, real smooth, Scarlett.) I hugged both of them, getting a nice bronzer mark on Ant’s crisp white shirt.

  As I stood in the line-up, realising I was going to be living with legends like Carol Vorderman, Larry Lamb, Lisa Snowdon and Sam Quek (I mean a gold Olympian, not only that but a kick-ass Girl Power Olympian who, alongside her team mates, had put the words ‘women’s hockey’ on everybody in the UK’s lips), I could hardly contain myself. God, if my eleven-year-old self could see me now. All those nights I cried myself to sleep because of the bullying, wishing I could be anybody else but me, wishing I could fit in more. How silly of me.

  If I could have a conversation now with my eleven-year-old self I would say, ‘Scarlett, you think you’re goofy, a little bit different to most other people; your brain constantly asks weird questions, you’re a sensitive soul who feels like she doesn’t quite fit in and struggles with accepting compliments. I am here to tell you all of those things are true. And sixteen years on, they’re still true. But embrace it because those characteristics are what make you you! Great things are coming, kid, you’ve just got to believe in yourself. (Also heads up, don’t admit to fancying Bart Simpson in a class discussion in Year 9; he is an animated character who looks like he has got severe jaundice – you will get unnecessary crap for it.)’

  I guess what I’ve learnt is lots of us (me included) try to change the things that make us, well, us. But we shouldn’t, we should just embrace it. It is crazy that I have only just realised that as I’ve got older, even though I read these words as a young child so many times:

  ‘Today you are you, that is truer than true.

  There is no one alive who is you’er than you.’

  I have a lot to thank Dr Seuss for.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I’M NOT QUITE A CELEBRITY… GET ME OUT OF HERE!

  All the camp-mates during their time in the jungle are allowed to choose one luxury item – which they may or may not receive at some point in camp. For my luxury item, I chose ‘a bottle of fake tan and a tanning mitt’. (Funnily enough, I didn’t need it.)

  It had been claimed that Danny Baker was responsible for Bob Marley’s death after treading on his foot during a charity football match in London in 1977. However, although Marley injured his foot in the game and cancer developed in his feet afterwards
, Baker never played in the game. He believes the rumour started from a joke on his radio show.

  Before Larry Lamb’s acting career took off, his job was to sell encyclopaedias to American soldiers in Germany.

  After I had been introduced on the show, I was feeling all sentimental and honoured to be stood there with my fellow camp mates and of course Ant and Dec. I was just so thankful that all of my camp mates looked friendly and happy. The year before they had had such a hard time with Lady C, and I didn’t want to go through that sort of thing.

  It was actually quite funny – when we were in the jungle, we didn’t know that Larry Lamb used to date Lady C. One night when we were sat round the camp fire, perched uncomfortably on a wooden log, I was chatting away about her. I was saying, ‘I’m pleased she isn’t in the jungle with us. I’m glad that we haven’t got any characters like her.’

  Then Larry told me, ‘Oh, I used to date her.’

  ‘Oh my God, I’m so sorry, Larry. You should have spoken up sooner.’ I was desperately trying to backtrack, saying, ‘I’m sure she is lovely, she just didn’t like any of the trials.’ But we had literally all sat there and slagged his sweetheart off for about half an hour. He’s still friends with her, so that was a very awkward moment.

  Speaking of Larry, my bloody entrance into the camp. What was all that about? If you haven’t seen it (please don’t YouTube it), it was probably the most embarrassing moment of my life. In my head, I thought that I was going to enter the camp like some sort of Bond girl. I’d be really cool in some sort of jumpsuit, leaping from a helicopter. Instead I was sat in a canoe. Now I don’t like any sort of water sports and canoeing is something I have never ever done properly and I don’t want to do it again either. When I’m in a restaurant, along with the actual money tip I always give a life tip: ‘Don’t stand up in a canoe.’