I’ve always thought I might have been quite good as an actor, and certainly enjoyed the lead roles I played in four or five plays at school.

I didn’t try out for anything at Cambridge, though, which is just as well as I would have found myself in competition with the likes of Derek Jacobi, Ian McKellen, Corin Redgrave, Peter Cook, John Bird and John Fortune.

But give me just the tiniest opportunity to pretend to be somebody else and I leap at the chance, especially when improvisation is involved.

When we lived in Waterloo, the place to do this was the Museum of the Moving Image which was laid out chronologically, from the first attempts to mimic movement via the advent of the talkies and on, decade by decade, up to contemporary times. Each section was staffed by actors, playing roles which did not extend beyond their given period. So if, for example, you found yourself in the 1940s and happened to mention Marilyn Monroe you were likely to receive a rather puzzled ‘Marilyn who?’ in return.

When accompanying visitors to the museum I used to take every opportunity to engage in conversation with the various characters.  The very first time I went there, in the opening week, I found myself in the 1930s watching a slim young woman, in spangled shorts, her brow slightly furrowed, lower lip caught between her teeth, as she tried and retried a tap sequence.  “Hey, you’re pretty good”, I said, to which she replied “Thanks. I’ve heard that Busby Berkeley is casting a new musical and I’m hoping he might come by and notice me. You never know.  Hey!”, she added. “You’re not Mr Berkeley, are you?”  “I’m nothing like him”, I said. “He doesn’t have a beard, to start with. But, I’ll tell you what. I’m doing the sets for the new movie, and I’ll tell Busby to come by and take a look at you.”  She thanked me effusively and I headed off towards the 1950s, where the woman selling tickets at the Odeon asked if I’d been there the week before when they were showing ‘Blackboard Jungle’ and the teddy boys had started dancing to ‘Rock Around the Clock’. Not what we called dancing, the two of us agreed.

That museum, sadly, is closed now. But last Sunday I went to another place in London, fixed firmly in the 1890s, where I was able once again to indulge in a little improvisation.

For some 40 years, Edward Linley Sambourne, known to his family and friends as Linley, was a regular contributor to the satirical magazine Punch as illustrator and cartoonist, becoming chief cartoonist in 1901 on the death of John Tenniel, (now best known as the original illustrator of the Alice books).

In 1875 he and his wife Marion moved into a splendid house, number 18 Stafford Terrace, just two streets north of Kensington High Street. It now belongs to the Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and is open to any visitors who for a few pounds (six in our case) are keen to be guided round a house decorated and furnished in the high victorian style.

We went in via the servants’ entrance, down the area steps through what would have been the kitchen, and were shown a very useful 10 minute film about the family.

Following this we went back to the street, then up the steps to the front door, which was opened by ....... Mrs Sambourne in full bustled dress, flustered and apologetic at having to open the door herself, “I don’t know what the maids are up to, I’ve rung and rung  but there’s absolutely no sign of them,” she said in evident distress.

She then invited us into the dining room, explaining that there had been eight of them to dinner the night before (“My husband acquired some very useful panels so that the table, normally seating no more than six as you can see, can, if needed, accommodate up to 12 people comfortably”).  She explained that the maids had served at dinner and might still be asleep, their having retired much later than usual (“though we bring in two men servants when really important people come to dine”.)

In each of the rooms to which we were taken, Mrs Sambourne pointed out the stained glass windows (“all designed by my husband”) and the wall paper (“bought from William Morris at first, though we have moved on since”) as well as their collections of oriental porcelain, English delftware and very modern furniture from the likes of Heals and Liberty.  (“We were among the first to adopt the Aesthetic approach to decoration”).   We agreed with her that this new electric light, despite its convenience, was much, much dimmer than the good old gas, and was probably a mistake.  There was, at this point, a “Marilyn who?” moment when one of our party, noticing a radiator, commented on the fact that they appeared to have something called “central heating”, which rather threw our hostess for the moment.

One floor higher up, with evident pride, she ushered us into the main drawing room, the lightest part of the house since it had been made from two rooms, which gave light from both north and south. (“Most days I receive visitors in the morning room on the ground floor, but this is where, on Tuesdays, I am AT HOME!”), adding that she and her particular friends, had worked things out so that there was no clash. (“Mrs Alma-Tadema receives on Mondays, Mrs Rider Haggard on Wednesdays, Mrs George du Maurier on Thursdays”).

“Ah, so you know the du Mauriers”, I said, referring to her husband’s colleague at Punch and his wife. “Yes indeed” was her retort. “You know them too, I assume”, she added, to which I replied that my wife and I had indeed been to their place in Hampstead on three or four Sundays (the day when the Du Mauriers held open house for lunch), adding that we were acquaintances rather than friends.  I went on to say that I had been gratified to meet Mr Henry James, the great American author,  on two of those occasions, but found those Sundays a little taxing, since Du Maurier always insisted on people joining him for a long walk on the Heath, rather trying after a large lunch. Mrs Sambourne agreed whole heartedly, before the discussion again became more general.

It seemed that her husband used to work at the far, southern end of the drawing room, but had taken over the room of his late mother on the floor above, which was much better for all concerned. (“Perhaps we will go up and I will see, assuming he is not too busy, if he will allow you to have a quick look at his studio”.)   Surprisingly, Mr Sambourne appeared to have popped out, (“possibly to smoke a cigar in the garden”) and we were, indeed, allowed into his sanctum.

This was north-facing, but a skylight had been set into the roof to help him with his work, the studio containing numerous examples of his cartoons and other illustrations for ‘Punch’, as well as a caricature of the man himself drawn by ‘Spy’ for Vanity Fair. Pride of place in the room, however, went to his camera. Mr Sambourne, it appeared, took many photographs, of himself and others, which formed the basis of many of his drawings, a few of which were also pinned up in the room (for one of which - depicting as it did a lightly clad young lady - our hostess felt she needed to apologise).

As indeed she did for the two or three photographs of actresses in the room of their son Roy, currently studying at Oxford, drawing our attention hurriedly from these, in my opinion rather innocent, examples of the photographer’s art, to a copy of The Water Babies laid out on the bed.  This was open to an illustration featuring not only her son but also her daughter Maud who “did some quite pretty illustrations for Punch herself, but she no longer does that kind of thing since she married, of course.”

By now we were at the top of the house, and we were allowed to look inside the attic room occupied by the maids (who also seemed, mysteriously, to have popped out).  Someone wondered how they both managed to sleep in the extremely narrow single iron bed, but Mrs Sambourne blithely explained that Annie slept with her head at the top and Mary with her head at the bottom, so that was all right then.

This left just one more room, the bathroom where Mr Sambourne developed his photographs.  Our group was packed in rather tightly, while our hostess pointed out the left-hand wall which was completely covered by photographs mostly of her husband in various exotic costumes. We, meanwhile, were transfixed by what was on the wall behind her until she turned round and, with an audible gasp, ushered us out of the room and off down the stairs.

To visit the Linley Sambourne house (and find out what so shocked the lady of the house) phone 0207 602 3316 or go to

http://www.rbkc.gov.uk/subsites/museums/18staffordterrace.aspx