Don’t Tell the Bride was getting an eight-year follow-up
The show continued checking what had happened to people who had appeared on *Don’t Tell the Bride*.
Michelle had been a bridesmaid at a wedding in which groom Dan knew bride Kate wanted something traditional in England.
His response had been to plan an Italian wedding with a Romeo and Juliet theme.
Michelle confirmed the last-minute chaos shown on television was real.
The bridesmaids genuinely did not know what was happening until extremely late in the process.
Scott and Chris remained fascinated by the show’s basic proposition: take one of the most expensive and emotionally loaded days of somebody’s life and deliberately remove the person most likely to care about the details.
Kevin wrote to the boy who thought he would have a wife and children
The day’s most powerful section came from the continuing letters to listeners’ 10-year-old selves.
Kevin, now 35, read his letter live.
He told the boy he had been that life would not follow the neat plan he imagined.
At ten, Kevin expected to grow up, marry a woman, have children and live the conventional happily-ever-after.
Instead he would realise he was attracted to boys.
For years he would beat himself up over being different and wish he could change.
Eventually he would understand there was nothing to change.
He would learn to accept and love who he was.
Kevin wanted his younger self to ask for help sooner
The letter did not pretend everything would then become easy.
Kevin warned his younger self about relationship mistakes, friendships that would come and go and family bereavements.
The most painful would be the sudden death of his dad.
The combination of bereavement and the end of a relationship would leave Kevin feeling unlike himself.
His advice across the years was clear: get help, be open and do not carry everything alone in the same way he had once hidden his sexuality.
He also told young Kevin to look after his mum and Mark because they would need him.
Scott and Chris were visibly affected
Kevin admitted the final section was difficult to read without wobbling.
Scott said the tears were starting.
Chris picked up on the word Kevin had used earlier — perspective.
Writing to a younger version of yourself forced people to look back at problems which once felt impossible and realise how much they had already survived.
Kevin said the exercise had made him proud.
He also explained that listening to Scott and Chris had helped inspire his interest in radio and that he now presented hospital radio himself.
The pair loved the thought that somebody who listened every day was now appearing on the very podcast that had kept him company.
Don’t Look It Up went back to 2013
The quiz included questions from 2013.
One asked which Radio 1 presenter had received an MBE in the New Year Honours, producing the answer Nihal.
There were also old *X Factor* memories and a twisted-audio round.
The heat caused another running argument because Chris had a fan switched on near his microphone.
Listeners were divided between letting him survive the temperature and making him suffer quietly like everyone else.
Chris Kamara picked the records
Chris Kamara took over the guest mix.
His selections included One Direction’s *History*, and the show remembered Scott filming *The Hit List* with Kammy in Glasgow the previous year.
That trip had ended with Scott and Kammy among the last people in the hotel bar alongside Nadine Coyle, Michelle Heaton and Antony Costa.
They agreed to make sure neither overslept.
Naturally, Scott was the one Kammy had to phone the following morning.
Their flight then spent hours delayed at Glasgow Airport because of a technical problem, leaving Kammy desperately trying to reach a Crystal Palace match.
He still made it.
Tap End spent New Year’s Eve in Glasgow
The Golden Moment went back to another Glasgow night.
Chris had spent Christmas at home, Boxing Day with his mates and a night at the darts.
For New Year’s Eve he had been offered a DJ booking at Mansion House in Glasgow.
His friends had not organised anything convincing at home, so Chris took mates Perkins and Latham north with him.
Perkins treated the flight like a foreign holiday to such an extent that he even packed sun cream.
Hogmanay felt more civilised than the night back home
Chris booked a steak restaurant before the club.
The group drank Irn-Bru rather than their usual energy-drink mixers and convinced themselves the evening had become extremely cultured.
Back home, messages suggested Chris’s friends were having a much messier time.
Little Ben had started drinking on the train and was already causing a scene before midnight.
Chris felt increasingly pleased with the Scottish option.
A toilet run almost collided with midnight
As midnight approached, Chris realised he needed the loo.
He timed the dash with around 30 seconds to spare.
By the time he returned, his friend had a drink waiting and Glasgow was counting down.
Everyone linked arms at midnight and Chris began his DJ set shortly afterwards.
He remembered the Hogmanay atmosphere as another level from an ordinary New Year’s Eve.
Looking back, the story became a snapshot of the end of 2012 — a year in which Chris’s life had changed dramatically — and of the group of friends who kept reappearing throughout *24 Years at the Tap End*.
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