He has notched up tours, albums, books and a sitcom. Why is he tortured by feelings of under-achievement? As Fellows hits the road, he pops an aniseed ball and discusses his new song – about an audience member falling off a cliff

When Graham Fellows first performed in character as amateur singer-songwriter John Shuttleworth, Margaret Thatcher was PM and A-ha were storming the charts. Fellows was 25; his beige vocalist and organist alter ego was in his late 40s. “I started doing it when I was very young,” recalls Fellows, not a little wistfully, when we meet at his agent’s office in London. “And I had to put makeup on: crow’s feet, white stuff in my hair.”

He goes on: “I remember doing a Lily Savage special in Blackpool for TV. And in the dressing room I was sat next to the lead singer of Showaddywaddy.” It never takes long for a Fellows/Shuttleworth anecdote to tend towards bathos. “He looked at me a bit askance and said, ‘This is odd. You’re there being made to look older, and I’m here being made to look younger.’” But the years roll around, and on the eve of his 40th anniversary tour as Shuttleworth, Fellows says: “I might have to start doing that now too.”