Meera Syal CBE is an actor, comedian, playwright and novelist whose work has left a lasting impression on the UK cultural landscape - from TV shows Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No 42 to her novel, Anita and Me, which has been taught on English literature GCSE syllabuses.

She has also appeared on stage in numerous West End shows and had a number one hit single with a cover of Spirit in the Sky, alongside Gareth Gates.

She chats with Tes about why she has always held teachers in high esteem, the important role that her Spanish teacher played in her life - academically and pastorally - and she recalls a school trip to Belgium that was memorable for all the wrong reasons.

Listen to the full interview as part of the Tes My Best Teacher podcast or read an abridged version below:

1. Where was your primary school?

I went to Perry Hall Primary School in Wednesfield, in the West Midlands. I grew up with an innate love and respect for teachers because my mum was a teacher. I saw the amount of love and care and time that she poured into her pupils; it never crossed my mind to rebel against a teacher or disrespect teachers because education was in my family.

2. And did that help you do well at school?

My dad used to say “education is your passport”, and that was drilled into me from a very early age. If you wanted to get on in this new country, you did it through your mind and the sweat of your brow. I think anyone who comes from a country where you have to pay for education - to get into a good school - understands that the concept of a free and good education is a wondrous thing and not to be taken for granted.

3. What about secondary school?

I went to the grammar school - Queen Mary High School in Walsall - after passing the 11-plus. The whole trajectory of your life could be decided on whether you pass that big, big test. If I hadn’t, I would have gone to a not very good local school, in which I would have been the only child of colour - I can’t imagine how tough that might have been in the 1970s in the West Midlands.

But, thanks to my mum and her tutoring at home, I passed to go to Queen Mary, which had a fantastic reputation and was very academic and high achieving. I entered thinking that I’d been given this amazing opportunity and I had to make my parents proud - I had to make them feel that all the sacrifice of coming here was worth it.

4. Aside from your mum, which teacher made the biggest impression on you?

The teacher who had a huge impact on me was my Spanish teacher, Ian Cartwright. He was a complete maverick, which made me go, “OK, I really like him”. He was a big northern bloke, he chain smoked - often in lessons. He played the guitar - often in lessons. And the way he taught Spanish was as a living, fun and relevant subject. He would teach us songs in Spanish, he would bring in articles; anything that was amusing and interesting and tangible to the subject.

He would make us think, so it wasn’t just about learning something because you have to pass an exam; it became fun. That is a huge skill, especially if you can combine it with getting fantastic grades, which he inevitably did.

5. Did he help pastorally, too?

He was the first person who took me to one side one day - I think I was probably going through some adolescent angst - and said “you’re probably under a lot of pressure”.

I think he knew what it was like for a kid from an Asian family. But also, I was quite shy, I was quite overweight, I was a bit nerdy, not part of the cool group. He could see that, socially, I was suffering - and he took the time to say “it’s great to be different; it will be the making of you because you see the world in a different way, you’re obviously really driven, you have curiosity”.

He picked out that here was this kid who was clearly outside the norm, not one of the cool crowd, and he took the time to say that the thing you think marks you out as lonely or different will be the thing that makes you stand out.

6. That must have made quite an impact.

I do remember feeling really quite overwhelmed because he noticed - he had seen a bit of me that no one else had, not parents or friends, nobody. As a really good teacher, he picked that out and that is remarkable, to take the time to do that.

I always felt he kept a paternal eye on me all through school because, naturally, once you took Spanish, everyone kept with it. He never lost a pupil, which says a lot about him - we wanted to be around his aura.

I think everyone in Spanish group came out with an A at A level - we wanted to please him, we wanted to do well for him because we thought he had given us so much back.

7. Have you seen him since you left school?

I have met him a couple of times: he came to a recording of Parkinson when I was on; my parents were there and they were so happy to see each other. And he came to see me in Shirley Valentine.

It’s such a wonderful thing when you are able to tell a teacher many decades on about the impact they had. I was able to say to him, “I don’t think I would be doing what I do now if I had not had that sudden light-bulb moment with you when you said ‘it’s OK to be who you are, cherish it’; that was the template for when I started acting and writing.” A good teacher can change the course of your life, I really believe that.

8. Do you feel the role that teachers can play is appreciated enough?

The general frustration I felt on behalf of my mum and feel for other teachers is that they are so undervalued - and certainly underpaid - and especially for what they are coping with now. They are going above and beyond - the teachers at my son’s school have been spectacular in their support, trying to keep pupils engaged.

9. What are some other fond memories you have of school?

Like every school of my generation, I remember being driven down to London to see the Tutankhamun exhibition and queuing for hours outside the British Museum. It was as spectacular as everyone said it would be.

I do remember thinking, “This is an exciting place”. Coming from Walsall and suddenly being in the hustle and bustle of everything, and, of course, seeing the West End theatres - there was this tiny seed somewhere inside going “wow”. Because I think, even then, I had this secret desire to try out for the theatre one day but didn’t have any idea about how to go about it. I do remember that thrill of being in London and this weird kind of “this feels a bit like home” [sense]. That was an amazing trip.

10. Any not-so-good trips?

We went on a disastrous school trip to Belgium. I think it was the first time the school had organised it and so everything was not tried and tested, and it was really miserable. On the ferry everyone was sick, the coach driver looked half-cut most of the time, the place that we stayed in was like a sub-youth hostel - and grimy, with one bathroom between 15 girls. It rained all the time.

I think it was, for a lot of us, the first time we had been away from our parents so, one evening, there was a mass cry-in in one bedroom - everyone crying and crying in that hysterical teenage-girl way because they were really homesick.

I was not one of the criers, though. I was saying “it will be over soon” and “we have to make the most it” in my Pollyanna way. But I do also remember thinking, “this is such a funny scene, this is comedic gold”.

Meera Syal’s new radio show Gossip and Goddesses with Granny Kumar begins on BBC Radio 4 on 10 February. She was speaking to Dan Worth, senior editor at Tes

To listen to the full interview, search “My Best Teacher” on your podcast platform of choice, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Google - or find the podcast hosted on the Tes website

This article originally appeared in the 5 February 2021 issue