Profile: Denise Simmonett

There I was, walking down the High Street on a nice Autumn afternoon, when I spotted a tin- shaker - do I cross over and avoid him, or do I delve in my purse for the obligatory one-pound coin?

 

Well, I thought, I know what he feels like - I've done it myself. It's a bit of a game really, tin- shaking - you're not allowed to rattle the tin in an aggressive manner, so you have to make eye contact with people, or have balloons to give out, so that the children want to stop and speak to you.

 

So, feeling a certain amount of pity for the collector, I made my donation and had a quick chat with him. He was wearing the Hospital Radio tee-shirt and although I knew that Hospital Radio existed, that was about all I knew. A few days later, in the local newspaper, I saw a small article saying how much the collection had raised and gave a telephone number for anyone interested in doing some voluntary work with the radio station.

 

Having worked for several years with the Southend Talking Newspaper for the Blind, I was used to hearing the sound of my own voice, so I thought, why not? I duly phoned and was sent an application form and asked to call in for an interview. Quaking in my boots - would it be a panel of "suits" asking me difficult questions? - no, it turned out to be a lady giving me the once-over in the corridor and I was then marched off with my clipboard around the Wards for an hour talking to patients and then it was back to the radio station to see the programme go out.

 

After the first hour of watching and listening, I was asked did I want to announce a request - "No. Absolutely not...well. ... yes. Perhaps I will".

 

The rest, as they say, is history and I am totally hooked .. I spent a few weeks just announcing requests and then was offered a go on the equipment - downloading the music from the computer, tuning the Presenters on and off air and playing CDs and the dreaded vinyl records as well as doing some announcing myself. It took me some months to master the equipment, as I only do one shift a week which is a Thursday evening, and it was about a year before I overcame my fear of the vinyl records.

 

With them, you have to line the needle up with the gap in the tracks on the record, but I finally managed to get it right, although there has been the odd occasion when I have played the wrong track. I've also left the microphones "open", which means the patients can hear us chatting between records which on one memorable occasion, was about the contents of our fridges! I've played the wrong track, a vinyl at the wrong speed and even played a jingle which made the whole computer network stop dead. So you see, we are just like the real thing - perhaps the BBC will headhunt me one day!