Angela Rippon on Strictly: “If I can prove that even at 79 you can still dance a cha-cha-cha, that’d be fantastic.”

Angela Rippon sits behind a table in the neat book-lined dining room of her west London home looking calm and composed, as she has for the past five decades presenting top TV shows and reading the news. Except this time it’s the 79-year-old who is making headlines – as the oldest contestant ever on Strictly Come Dancing.

Angela jokes how she’s been ‘Strictlyfied’ but, let’s face it – fake tans and glitter aside – she is no stranger to glamour, as 27 million viewers discovered watching the 1976 Morecambe and Wise Christmas Show.

The moment she stepped out from behind her newsreading desk – her long, shapely legs on display – to entertain us with her high-kicking dance routine has gone down in history and she still gets asked about it to this day.

“Barely a day goes by when someone doesn’t stop me in the street and ask me what it was like working with them,” she says.

These days Angela is just as flexible. She can still do an impressive high kick, as she proved on the first Strictly live show in a performance judge Craig Revel Horwood called ‘jaw-dropping’.

She can even still do the splits but nonetheless wishes she’d been asked to compete in Strictly when she was a bit younger.

“It’s the first time the BBC has asked me to do it and I must admit my reaction was, ‘why didn’t you ask me ten years ago when I was younger?’,” she says.

But thanks to a daily fitness regime that keeps her in fine fettle, she’s giving the younger contestants a run for their money.

“Every single morning, I do stretching exercises for ten minutes, then I’m out of the door at 7am for a 45-minute power walk,” she says.

“I play tennis with friends, do Pilates, cycle on a Sunday, and take a ballet class at the Royal Academy of Dance when I can. I am an ambassador for the Silver Swans, who run ballet classes for over-55s.”

Despite following such a healthy regime, Angela was cautious about agreeing to be in the show, as she knew it’d be a huge challenge.

“I did take a long time to think about it,” she says. “I didn’t give them an answer immediately, because I am aware of the fact that I’m 79.”

Three-and-a-half years ago, she had surgery to replace a shoulder riddled with arthritis. She demonstrates how mobile it is now, but adds, “it’s not quite as strong as the other one. I’m taking on quite a challenge, but I believe I’m fit and strong enough to do it.”

Angela currently presents the BBC’s Rip-Off Britain, although her career has seen her host shows including Antiques Roadshow and Top Gear, as well as six royal weddings.

“Covering the Queen’s funeral for Australian TV didn’t faze me, but Strictly is something quite, quite different.”

But, even with her reputation for being unflappable, she’s still understandably nervous about performing live to the nation every Saturday night. However, her strapping dance partner, Kai Widdrington, 28, has helped her find her dancing feet.

“I had huge anxieties until the point when I met him because I was really worried about doing something which is in many ways out of my comfort zone,” she says.

“Covering the Queen’s funeral for Australian TV didn’t faze me, but Strictly is something quite, quite different.”

When she talks about Kai, her eyes light up.

“He is just adorable, I love him,” she says. “I have met his partner [fellow Strictly dancer Nadiya Bychkova] and we have all gelled.”

“I said I wanted someone who is strong because I’m going to be hanging on to him rather a lot, and someone with a great sense of humour and patience.”

“Kai has all of those in bucket-loads. I have enormous trust in him. He said to me, ‘Don’t worry, whatever happens I’ll catch you’. Once someone as gorgeous as him says that, you don’t worry about the little things.”