Throughout the interview, she is punctilious in giving credit to those who have helped her in aspects of her stage and film career, either creatively or in other ways. It is a natural extension of her personal political viewpoint. “I am not really interested in ideology,” she says. “What I am interested in is fairness.”

Inevitably, there has been some speculation – following Alex Salmond stepping down as First Minister and Nicola becoming Scotland’s top politician – as to how the two Alpha females truly get on; women’s friendships can be chancy things at the best of times.

One telling anecdote from Elaine puts that in perspective. She had lost Nicola’s mum’s email address in Ayrshire, so she texted the First Minister, hoping some aide would supply the information. At the time, Nicola was in New York for a quite crucial TV interview on chat show host Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show. Watched by 1.5 million Americans, it is regarded as the country’s most influential programme and a springboard for politicians to gain instant international recognition. President Obama, Hillary Clinton, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have all appeared on the show, with somewhat mixed results.

For Nicola Sturgeon, it was her first venture onto the international stage as First Minister. And things had already goten off to a bad start, with her being billed in the original TV programming notes as a comedian instead of a politician.

Nevertheless, in that rather fraught situation, The First Minister took time out to personally text Elaine the missing email address.

“I was astounded,” said Elaine. “I had expected her to ask an aide to handle it, but she didn’t.”

That was a great morale booster. But there have been huge political disappointments, too. No examination of the life and times of Elaine C. Smith would be complete without talking about the Referendum in which she gave her all. She travelled

28 August 2015