I slept with my husband on first date, but people can’t believe how many men I’ve had sex with, says Andrea McLean
SHE has never been partial to a one-night stand but TV’s Andrea McLean admits she slept with her husband on their first date.
The former Loose Women panellist felt sparks fly after meeting businessman Nick Feeney on a blind date organised by one of the ITV show’s make-up artists in 2015.
But she confesses she had zero expectation that romance would blossom — or that they would end up between the sheets — when she met.
She says: “Neither of us wanted to be there. We didn’t really care if the date worked out or not because we weren’t interested, and we weren’t looking for anything serious.
“We were in Brighton and a hen party came around the corner, and they all yelled, ‘Let’s get a picture’, so they took out their phones. Meanwhile Nick was like, ‘What the hell?’ He didn’t know that I was on TV.
“It was literally an hour into our date, so when they left I told him. Suddenly it dawned on him, and he said, ‘You’re that one who sits at the end’.
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“I proceeded to get very drunk and told him everything about myself. We snogged and I went home with him, which is something I’d never done in my whole entire life.”
The pair tied the knot two years later at a star-studded ceremony in London and have been blissfully happy ever since.
Friendship group
Andrea, 52, adds: “I’ve been married three times and I’ve only slept with someone that I haven’t been married to once — so four people in total.
“My number is not very high, so it’s quite a big deal that I did that. I thought, ‘Why not? He seems nice’.”
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The TV presenter was previously married to her childhood sweetheart, BBC producer Nick Green, from 2000 to 2005, and they share son Finlay, 20.
In 2009 she wed Our House presenter Steve Toms, the father of her daughter Amy, 15, but the marriage broke down two years later.
These days, Andrea works with hubby Nick on her lifestyle app, This Girl Is On Fire, having left the Loose Women panel in 2020.
She says: “By the time I came to make the decision, I felt so ready — I’d made my mind up.
"I was still really scared, and I didn’t know if my new business venture was going to work but I love what I do, and I do it now knowing it’s going to help other people.”
After leaving the ITV daytime show Andrea lost several brand deals — which she described as “financially like a punch in the stomach” — and eventually sold her Surrey home.
We’re the same as everyone else, but we understand each other and sometimes you need to get it off your chest.
Thankfully, her app, which is aimed at menopausal women, now boasts several hundred members and working with her hubby is proving rewarding — though that does not mean they don’t bicker.
She says: “We’re the same as everyone else, but we understand each other and sometimes you need to get it off your chest. I find it also makes us stronger as a couple.”
Despite working on Loose Women for more than a decade, Glasgow-born Andrea — who began her TV career as a weather girl on GMTV in 1997 — reveals she keeps in touch with only a handful of her former co-stars.
She says: “I get asked if the other ladies and I see each other, and I’m like, ‘Not really’, but then I never really saw them when we were working together because everyone is busy.
“Denise [Welch] did a podcast, so I spoke to her the other day, and obviously Brenda [Edwards] and Linda [Robson]. It’s kind of the same type of people I kept in touch with when I was there. It’s the same as a normal friendship group where you do much of your thing on WhatsApp.”
But Andrea, who confesses she didn’t attend former co-star Stacey Solomon’s recent wedding to Joe Swash, is no longer a part of the group chat.
She says: “I’m not in the group any more. I left it because there was lots of work talk and I don’t need to know that any more.”
Set to turn 53 next month, Andrea is determined to get back in shape after gaining weight in the pandemic.
Amazingly the extra pounds have all gone on to her breasts — and she agrees they have never looked better.
She says: “I put on a stone since leaving Loose, and that’s because I’m not as active — I’m at home working, but I’m quite chilled about it.
Everything hurts
“I haven’t lost the stone yet, but I’m not bothered as most of it has gone on to my boobs — I’ve never had such great boobs.
“I totally fell off the fitness wagon for well over a year. I literally sat at my desk doing maybe 50 steps a day. I let my gym membership go because of Covid and everything else, so I’ve started hitting the gym again — I was there this morning.
“I’m now back to three days a week — weight training, lots of stretching, and I love it. Although, when you haven’t gone for a while, everything creaks and hurts.”
The new chapter in Andrea’s life is an exciting one and has been freeing for her, and she now feels she can be more open about her life.
She says: “I don’t represent anyone else other than me now, whereas before I was always very aware that when I was asked questions, it was a collective answer because I represented ITV and Loose Women.
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“I took my job very seriously — I always wanted to do them proud. But now I represent just me, so I can say whatever I want to say.”
- Fabulous spoke to Andrea at the launch of her wellness app This Girl Is On Fire at Soho Hotel, London.