See Emily play

Emily Firmin was rewarded for her performance with a bag of sweets

By Jonathan Duffy BBC News Magazine

Of all the children Oliver Postgate, who has died aged 83, cast his spell over, perhaps none fell under it more than Emily Firmin - the real Emily from Bagpuss.

Immortalised in a handful of sepia photos that form the opening credits of the classic childhood TV series, it was Emily who brought her "saggy old cloth cat" to life at the start of each episode by placing before him a mysterious object.

The mock Victorian sequence is seared into the memories of a generation:

"Once upon a time, not so long ago," ran the introduction - voiced by Postgate himself - on top of a sparsely plucked theme tune, "there was a little girl and her name was Emily. And she had a shop."

Dad and Oliver [above] worked together as a team. My dad would be in the cow shed and Oliver would be in the old pig sty Emily Firmin Bagpuss and Ivor creator dies

Although only 13 episodes of Bagpuss were ever made, the series went on to become a classic of children's television - these days regularly topping polls of favourite childhood TV shows.

Reflecting on the news of the death of Postgate, Emily Firmin, now 43, recalls a "wonderful, generous man [with a] gift for telling children's stories" who was "instrumental" in her decision to study animation and her career choice as an artist.

But Emily was no stage school wannabe. Her credentials for the part owed more to family connection than any prodigious ambitions to appear on TV.

The youngest of six children of Postgate's creative partner, illustrator Peter Firmin, the choice of Emily - and the decision that the character should share her name - was emblematic of Postgate's unpretentious approach.

After all, the Firmin family's home - a sprawling farmstead in Kent - doubled up at the time as the film set for many Postgate classics such as the Clangers and Ivor the Engine, as well as Bagpuss.

"The studio was next to my stable in a retired cow shed. It was a real cottage industry. Dad and Oliver worked together as a team. My dad would be in the cow shed and Oliver would be in the old pig sty.

"I'd come home from school and bring them tea and I'd have to knock on the door in case they were filming mid-scene."

This homespun feel was a big part of the finished product - something which perhaps now lends Postgate's work charm and authenticity, with the emphasis in animation having shifted to computers.

Morse Code camera

"I remember Oliver showing me how the camera worked," recalls Emily. "He had mounted it on a rostrum made of Meccano and because it was stop-animation, you had to start and stop the filming very quickly, so Oliver had rigged up a Morse Code button with which to operate it."

Bagpuss gained cult appeal among adults in the 1990s

And while Bagpuss gave her her starring role, it was the Clangers that made more impact on her as a child.

"The Clangers was so much of an event. Their moon took up about half of the barn."

Even the frilly Victorian dress that Emily was immortalised in for the Bagpuss sepia title sequence was knocked up by her mother. It was teamed with a pair of "horrible" old shoes Emily had been taken out to buy.

And the window of the "unusual shop" inhabited by Bagpuss, Madeleine the ragdoll, Professor Yaffle et al - "was my parent's dining room window", says Emily.

Why does she think Bagpuss has retained its appeal after all these years?

"The stories allow children to be children. They weren't trying to be trendy and so they've stood the test of time."

How does she look back on her association with Bagpuss nearly 40 years after giving up a morning to pose as Emily (for which she was rewarded with a bag of sweets)?

"I'm very proud. Everyone is always impressed. I'm always amazed when you get little children sending fan mail - I've had two letters just this week."

The public's reaction is almost universally reverential, she says, "although there are a couple of strange responses I get".

"Some people are incredulous that I'm not about 80 years old, because those pictures were so deliberately aged