Mary Berry: 'I was naughty at school, a real monkey'

‘I feel like Lady Mary,” says Mary Berry, the nation’s favourite cake-maker and octogenarian. She’s dressed for a party, blonde bob glowing, blue eyes shining, looking at herself in a mirror at Highclere Castle (Downton Abbey to you and me). This is a snippet from her new BBC television show, Mary Berry’s Country House Secrets, about the nation’s most loved stately homes.

Her clothes will probably get more attention than the ballrooms and kitchens she snoops around. She arrives at Highclere in a camel coat and jaunty burgundy trilby; in another episode she strides across moors in gorgeous tweeds and does Scottish reeling with a tartan shawl pinned to her shoulder. There are a lot of body warmers (Mary likes to be cosy). At Highclere, she sweeps down the main staircase in a low-backed sequined oyster-coloured gown with a train.

You have to hand it to her. People half her age couldn’t pull...