THAT’S Sally Magnusson, I told myself, recognising the TV presenter and regular host on BBC’s Songs of Praise as she walked down Cornmarket Street.

Could it really be 25 years since we middle-aged lads in the newsroom voted her the girl we’d most like our sons to bring home to meet the family, while nominating her the natural successor to Dame Joan Bakewell as the thinking man’s crumpet?

A camera team and Songs of Praise producer Charlotte Hindle were trying to get a shot of Sally wandering down the street while talking to the camera. I saw half a dozen attempts, the first five marred by shoppers innocently walking across the line of vision.

The hymn-singing part of the operation was already “in the can” said Charlotte. Where had it been recorded, I asked, expecting the name of some city centre church.

“Gravesend,” she said, “Sally wasn’t at the recording. We’re here to interview someone at the university so we took the opportunity to do the outdoor shots.”

Gravesend church and Oxford street? Where is the connection? Ah well...

Sally couldn’t stay; she had a train to catch. The final walkabout was quickly recorded before she headed off.

When would the programme be screened? February 19, said Charlotte, while recruiting me to explain – in front of the camera – what I meant by the word “temptation”.

We know things are not always what they seem, but this was downright confusing.

* GOD helps those who help themselves – or so they say. Wadham College classics student and founder and producer of Illyria Productions, Aidan Grounds, and marketing guru Carlene Kuschke – reading classics at Brasenose College – were distributing posters along Cowley Road. They were drumming up audiences for their next production, The Hothouse, by Harold Pinter, to be staged at the Oxford Playhouse from February 1-4.

Illyria has come a long way since Aidan first launched it in 2008. By his own admission, this is their biggest play yet attempted. With the dedication shown by the dynamic duo, I reckon they are on to a winner.

* FINALLY, a word of thanks to those readers who wished me well when I had to undergo treatment last summer for prostate cancer. This week I was given the good news that I had no need to return to the Churchill Hospital until January 22, 2013.

I know I have been lucky, thanks to my GP insisting on an ‘MOT’ in spite of my vanity. If I could persuade all men ‘of a certain age’ to do the same, it would be wonderful.

Come on, chaps. As Clint Eastwood used to say in those spaghetti westerns: “Make my day.”