Laura's Diary — A Season-by-Season Guide
Laura's Diary was a long-running feature on The Scott Mills Show on BBC Radio 1, in which Laura's sister Mary Sayers read aloud from Laura's real teenage diaries. It began in October 2005 while Scott's team was covering for Chris Moyles on the Radio 1 Breakfast Show, and ran across five seasons between 2005 and 2006. So popular it moved from the Breakfast Show cover slot to Scott's regular afternoon programme, it was eventually published as a book on 30 November 2006.
Season 1 — "The Early Years" (October 2005)
Setting: York, 1993. Laura is around 14–15.
The feature began entirely by accident. Scott had been discussing on air how wrong it was for people to read their siblings' diaries — only for Laura's sister Mary to ring in and reveal she'd done exactly that, finding Laura's old diaries in her bedroom in York. With a little persuasion, Mary agreed to read extracts aloud on Radio 1 each morning that week.
Mary originally performed the readings in a comically exaggerated American accent, a choice that was never explained but immediately beloved — it faded out naturally over the following days.
The cast:
- Jamie — Laura's main crush. Trendy, wears Lynx Africa deodorant, has a cool cap. Laura calculates an 88% marriage compatibility with him.
- Andy — a rival love interest who complicates things.
- Casey — tries to kiss Laura at the York fair, causing some unwanted drama.
- Sarah — a frenemy at school who mocks Laura's choice of top.
Key entries:
28 August 1993: School is boring. Laura has had a dream about Jamie — kissed him, looked into his eyes. She's working out their compatibility percentages. Bruno Mars's "Shake The Room" makes her think of him. Her dad grounds her for leaving her bedside lamp on.
14 September: Escaped swimming. Got told off in music. Two girls sent home for experimenting with cannabis. Laura goes to the fair in York with Jamie — he lets her wear his coat on the way home. Casey tries to kiss her. She's stressed about whether to let him.
Later entries: Laura ends up in a spin-the-bottle game at a house party. The bottle lands on Ben three times (he has to kiss Gemma, Lisa and Emma in quick succession). Laura desperately hopes it will land on her. Jamie spoke to her, but Andy is also being nice. She's torn between them and genuinely doesn't know what to do.
By the end of the season, Laura has accidentally got off with Andy on a bridge in York — then almost immediately starts to move on as Jamie shows interest. Her father remains a source of comic despair throughout: strict, easily irritated, apparently spends a lot of time grounding her.
Season 2 — "The College Years" (January 2006)
Setting: College, 1996. Laura is around 16–17.
Season 2 jumped forward two years, and the diary had now acquired a name: Laura addresses it as "Alice." Mary's American accent returned briefly by popular demand, then vanished again.
Key entries:
8 April 1996: Charity day at college. Laura gets told off twice — once by Richard Thompson in German for whistling out of a window. Her dad fines her a week's pocket money for shovelling her food and eating her dessert with the wrong fork. ("Sometimes adults are so lame.") Anthony is coming over at 7 for her piano lesson — and she's going to freshen up first.
The piano teacher Anthony is the emotional centrepiece of this season: Laura clearly has a significant crush on him, describing the need to "freshen up" before his arrivals, and the entries radiating a kind of nervous excitement around these lessons that the team found endlessly entertaining.
Note: A mysterious recurring figure begins to appear in the diary from this season onwards, referred to on air only as "Mr X" — described as vaguely famous, someone who has been on TV, and someone who cannot be named for legal reasons. Scott managed to reveal that his first initial is J, but that is as far as the show was ever able to go publicly.
Season 3 — "The Summer of Ben" (Summer 2006)
Setting: York and Glasgow, 1997. Laura is 18, post-A levels.
Season 3 moved to the 5pm slot (after the watershed) — which, as Scott pointed out, would allow the diary to be a little more frank.
Key entries:
Laura is working in a hotel over the summer, dealing with a difficult colleague, and has met a boy called Ben, guitarist in a band called Monster Sunshine, via her brother Henry. Ben is clearly smitten — he turns up unexpectedly at the hotel to surprise her, wearing the aftershave she likes, and sneaks into a spare room for the night. ("It was embarrassing because I hadn't shaved, but he didn't seem to mind.")
A university place in Glasgow is confirmed and looming. Laura is apprehensive, but Ben is supportive and promises to visit. Season 3 ends on something of a high: they're officially together and happy, with Laura wearing his plectrum around her neck as he instructed.
Season 4 — "The University Years" (March–October 2006)
Setting: Glasgow, 1997. Laura is 18–19 at university.
Season 4 is the longest, darkest and funniest season — following Laura through her first year at Glasgow, her faltering relationship with Ben at long distance, and a series of increasingly chaotic decisions.
Key entries:
23 September 1997: Can't sleep. The people in the flat above are at it — again — for what feels like an hour. Three boys have moved into her flat but they're four years older than her and smoke, and she finds them intimidating. One of them suggests almost immediately that she should move out because they're not going to get on. ("How long have you been there, Laura? Like a day?") She decides she would rather move all her shoes out of the kitchen than actually leave.
October 1997: Her hair starts falling out — possibly stress. She's been getting off with a flatmate called Alan, something she knows she should tell Ben about but can't quite bring herself to do. When she eventually tells Ben what happened, he's understandably upset — but by her next entry she has somehow managed to feel like the wronged party in the situation.
Also October: Laura is introduced by friends to a man who is described as "vaguely famous, been on TV" — referred to on air only as Mr X (initial: J). He appears only briefly in the diary.
November 1997 — "Mr Sandman" entry: Laura is clearly drunk. Mary reads it with increasing bewilderment, since none of it quite makes sense. At one point Laura calls someone in her halls "a teeny-bopper trying to dance in silks." She says she's going to buy a plant. Scott: "What the hell was that?" Mary: "I have absolutely no idea."
18 November 1997 — "National Hangover Day": Laura is in a bad way. Ben rang — in a mood. He said she kept going on about Jenny last night. He says things have to change. She asks: what, like her accent? He does not find this funny. She compares him unfavourably to her father.
20 November 1997: Ben dumps her. By letter. He says she's changed, her paranoia has become too much, and he can't deal with such an intense relationship with his exams coming up. Laura is devastated. Her throat and eyes hurt from crying. She can't breathe. She finishes the painting she was doing of him and considers ripping it up. His jumper doesn't smell of him anymore. She keeps looking out at the city lights.
Mary, reading this aloud on air, genuinely gets upset. Scott has to thank her and offer comfort.
Season 4 finale — 1 September 1997: Laura can't stop listening to Counting Crows. She feels lonely and anonymous. Mr X is, apparently, seeing someone. Even her friend Melon Allen has got together with someone. She considers walking into a pub and shouting "I believe in you" at strangers. She doesn't think anyone would notice.
The season finale coda: After the final diary entry, the team tracked down Ben — the real Ben, who has since left the country — and got him on the phone. He said going out with Laura was "interesting" and confirmed the Skegness trip. The team bid him farewell.
Season 5 — "The Final Chapter" (October 2006)
Setting: York, summer 1998. Laura is 19–20.
Season 5 — "The Final Chapter" — aired in October 2006 to much fanfare, while Scott was covering for Chris Moyles on the Radio 1 Breakfast Show, giving it a significantly larger audience than usual. Mary is now referred to as "Foxy Mary" after a separate on-air bit about a listener who believed they were turning into a fox. This is never really explained to new listeners.
Key entries:
11 August 1998: Ben back in Laura's life. He came round from work and had a shower, leaving wet towels everywhere. Laura's father objects, mainly because he considers Ben's presence intrusive, despite himself walking around in his nightshirt ("stripey, almost medieval") and sprawling on the lounge floor in positions nobody should have to witness.
19 August: Laura, her friend Dan, and brother Rouse head to Silks nightclub with Ben. Laura has seven bottles of Hooch. Ben gets sick on her and she puts him in a taxi. She tells her father the next day that she occasionally smokes in pubs. He tells her she's let him down. He also smokes. She notes this.
21 August: Ben groans the name "Charlotte" in his sleep. Laura cannot decide whether she heard him properly. She does not confront him. Charlotte is the girlfriend of Ben's friend Callum — but Laura convinces herself there must be something going on, and writes to Melanie C of the Spice Girls for advice, reasoning that the Spice Girls are "experienced women of the world." Melanie C does not reply.
1 September: Laura decides the only thing to do is become the best girlfriend Ben has ever had, in order to prevent him dumping her when he goes to university. She is getting her highlights done. She is buying him presents.
8 September: Ben says Charlotte again in his sleep. Laura writes a poem in the diary about loyalty, paranoia and love. She has also told Callum that his girlfriend has been flirting with Ben, based on no real evidence at all, in order to create distance between them. Scott: "She's properly evil here."
11 September 1998 — The Final Entry: Laura thinks she might be pregnant. They were careful, but something went wrong. The family planning centre is closed. Ben says he'll go with her to the drop-in centre tomorrow. She keeps touching her tummy. She can't tell her mum. She knows her dad will go mental. She knows Ben is going to dump her in two weeks anyway.
Laura starts crying in the studio. For real.
Mary finishes reading. Scott thanks her. Laura can't speak. It ends there.
Epilogue
Laura's Diary was published as a book on 30 November 2006, containing entries never broadcast on air.
The feature led to 'One Night with Laura', which eventually found her a husband.
Download Options
This is currently unavailable while we move servers.
Help us upgrade the Unofficial Mills servers and boost site speed by donating through Ko-fi. We're one of the largest UK radio communities around and we want to keep the community online.
