CHEF'S STEP-MUM HELPS PENPAL, 96
10:30 - 26 July 2003
The step-mum of celebrity chef Ainsley Harriott has rescued her homesick penpal from a Cheltenham care home.
May Horan, 96, moved into Bredon View in St Mark's three months ago because she didn't want her family to worry about her any more. She soon found she missed her old house in Arle.
So Claudine Harriott-Boyer spent ¡Ì900 from her own pocket and used plenty of elbow grease to make sure the OAP's home was spruced up for her return.
Mrs Harriott-Boyer, 70, spent 10 days painting, dusting, buying appliances and laying carpets.
When Mrs Horan arrived home she couldn't believe her eyes.
Before yesterday, she had lived in the house for 20 years without a washing machine.
Now she has a one and a new fridge thanks to Mrs Harriott-Boyer, who was married to Ainsley's dad Chester and looked after the star of BBC1's Can't Cook, Won't Cook when he was a child.
Mrs Horan said: "It's wonderful to be back in my house and have friends like Claudine."
The widow has fond memories of her house because it is where she lived with her husband Peter. He died in 1999.
"I have a sense that he is here looking after me," said Mrs Horan. "I wouldn't be anywhere else."
Mrs Horan, who is blind in one eye and has cataracts in the other, met Mrs Harriott-Boyer in the 1960s at Hill Top Farm in Eldersfield, near Tewkesbury, which was owned by a mutual friend.
They became firm friends, meeting occasionally and regularly swapping letters and poems for the past two years.
Mrs Harriott-Boyer lives in Manchester. She divorced her husband of 40 years in 1993 and sees Ainsley now and again.
She said: "I broke my arm seven months ago and I had to go into a home. I realised how sad the elderly people were there.
"When I visited May in the home I could see that her spirit was dying."
Mrs Horan's husband was an Army officer. They travelled extensively during his career, living in South Africa before he was taken prisoner by the Japanese in the Second World War.
Mrs Harriott-Boyer added: "Seeing this woman who has travelled the world sitting on her own in the home was awful. The staff and the home were fine but May wanted to live in her house."
Mrs Horan will be visited by a social services carer from Monday.
She is celebrating her return with a family party today.