You know her best as Lisa Fowler in EastEnders, but just before she joined the BBC1 soap in 1998, Lucy Benjamin had a very different job. "I was 28, and my acting work had dried up; times were really hard and I didn't have a job," Lucy tells me. "My dad ran an import-export business at Heathrow Airport, so I said to him, you've got to give me a job, I need a job. And so I ended up as a white van driver. But not a very good one - he fired me!" Why? "I had a puncture on the M25. I'd been to the bank and I'd put the petty cash, about 150 quid, in the side door. I pulled over onto the hard shoulder, opened the door, cars were driving past at 80 miles-per-hour, and the petty cash flew out all over the motorway. I left the van on the hard shoulder and walked off. I thought I'm in so much trouble... I told me dad it was his fault - he should have checked the tyres. He said I was fired, I said I'm resigning! And the next day I got EastEnders. I'd been a jobbing actress before then, I'd had breaks, but this was life-changing. It was huge. People recognised me in the street."

Her character Lisa Shaw, conceived as a "home-wrecking blonde", had a fling with her market inspector boss Michael Rose, then Gianni D'Marco, then wheezing alpha thug Phil Mitchell...who she shot. The reveal to 2001's 'Who Shot Phil?' saga attracted 20 million viewers. "People were on Lisa's side," Lucy, 55, laughs. "They thought I should've done a better job and killed him. He was such a horror. It was a glorious time to be in the show." Executive producer Matthew Robinson (Tom's brother) had instructed all seven suspects to tell fellow cast members it wasn't them. "That was hard, lying to your colleagues, but that's why that storyline worked so well. It got OTT for a while. I was all over the front of magazines, FHM, Closer, and newspapers. You're body-shamed...you don't realise how tough it was until you get out of it. Flipping heck, I don't know how I managed, but I'm here to tell the tale and in one piece."

Lisa left the Square in 2003, after marrying Mark Fowler, and keeps coming back, resurfacing with a gambling problem in 2023. You wouldn't bet against another return. "It's lovely that they keep the door open for me. Lisa is like a comfort blanket, a massive part of my life. I loved EastEnders. You get to do your craft every day." Right now, she's keen to start playing Mrs Bates in the hilarious new stage version of Jane Austen's Emma, written by award-winning playwright Ava Pickett, which opens at London's Rose Theatre next month. "It's a very funny love story set in modern-day Essex," says Lucy, her hazel eyes twinkling. "Mrs Bates is a gossipy beautician with a good heart. She is adorable, a bit simplistic in her ways, but happy with her lot - very different to Emma who isn't happy with her lot and thinks the locals are boring, insular, and small-minded. Emma's life is a bit of a car crash; she keeps making bad choices. To her, Mrs Bates is a pain in the backside."

They replicate the infamous hilltop scene where Emma publicly humiliates her. "She is so cruel to Mrs Bates in front of other people, she starts to unravel." Emma (Amelia Kenworthy) finally sees the errors of her ways and changes. "She realises the value of love and friendships, family and community." Lucy adores every aspect of the play. Except commuting to rehearsals from her Essex home. "I was at Clapham Junction yesterday waiting for a train and a proper fisticuffs fight broke out in broad daylight. Something had been stolen in the street, kids were having a pop and this fella threw a roller-skate at one of them which missed me by inches. I said, 'Oi, that nearly hit me!' I love people-watching and seeing the world go by, but things are unravelling a bit. That's the horrible side of London." Almost like living in Albert Square...

Lucy Benjamin was born Lucy Jane Baker in Reading, Berkshire, later adopting her brother's first name as her stage name. He still seethes when people ask if his name is Ben Benjamin, she laughs. Attending Redroofs Theatre School, Lucy made her West End debut aged 9, playing one of the orphans in doomed musical Barnardo starring James Smillie and Fiona Fullerton. "It lasted three weeks, but it was my entry into showbiz and also an important lesson - don't count your chickens, luv, things can be pulled quickly. That put me in good stead for the future. I didn't have rose-tinted glasses about showbiz." At 12, she made her TV debut in a 1983 episode of Doctor Who, playing a younger version of the Doc's companion Nyssa. "I feel like I've been around forever," she laughs.

Many roles followed, including main parts in ITV sitcom Closer To Home and children's comedy-drama Press Gang. She has also popped up in The Bill ("as some crook"), Murder Most Horrid, Casualty, Staying Alive, and more. Lucy's roles are more demanding, and more fulfilling now. She spent six months with the Royal Shakespeare Company playing Eleanor, Duchess of Gloucester, in Henry VI parts 2 & 3, and relished playing Maggie in BBC sitcom The Detectorists and Velma Von Tussle in Hairspray. 2009's I'm A Celebrity was more stressful. "I did it because I was such a fan of Ant & Dec, and I'm glad. It was something I'd never put myself through normally - I don't do camping or trekking, I don't like the outdoors. It's incredible how your body adjusts, sleeping as the sun goes down and getting up when it rises."

Last year, Lucy separated amicably from her husband, businessman Richard Taggart, after 18 years of marriage. Still friends, they co-parent their teenage daughters. "We'll always be a team," she says. "We've nailed it. The kids are 14 and 18. They come to me for advice about boys and relationships. When they bring their mates round, I'm part of the gang. My little one goes to West Ham with her dad. They keep me on my toes. They probably think I repeat myself too much and bark too many commands. But if they don't answer you the first time, you have to repeat it."

Lucy relaxes by reading and gardening. "I'm a bit boring, a home girl. I like a nice glass of wine, a bit of good telly. Ricky Gervais makes me laugh out loud. So does my friend La Voix (Christopher Dennis) who is about to go on Strictly. I love my football, loved the Lionesses. The atmosphere at women's football is different. Fans on both sides cheering each other on. There's more camaraderie."

After Emma, she plays evil panto sorceress Agatha in Beauty & The Beast at Guildford's Yvonne Arnaud Theatre. "I'd love to go back to my roots and do more musical theatre," she says. "I'd like to play Miss Hannigan in Annie and Madame Thénardier in Les Mis. But listen, I'm not fussy, if a job comes along and it works for my kids and I can get there and I like the script I'll do it."

Intriguingly she says she won't write her autobiography while her mum is alive. "I've got stories to tell. Maybe when I'm older. I've done some things in my life." For now, Emma is on her mind. "Mrs Bates is glorious to play. Garry, you would love this comedy. Ava Pickett who wrote the script is a genius, she's authentic. She's nailed it. It's like a sitcom. There's a farce element...it should get people into the theatre. It's so today, so relatable. I can't wait for my kids to see it."

*Emma has its world premiere at London's Rose Theatre from September 17 to Oct 11.