Rewind channel starts repeats of gloriously funny sitcom You're Only Young Twice

It shone out of schedules packed with Euro-trash – otherwise known as Eurovision. Since when has one-night only not been enough for the epic song contest?

Or you could watch Martin Clunes on his holidays, Jane McDonald cruising or, in exactly the same vein – vain would be just as apt – Susan Calman enjoying sailing the world.

When thousands of people in the country struggle to make ends meet, eschewing luxuries like holidays, such programmes amount to ‘rubbing our noses in it’.

Step forward, You’re Only Young Twice. It was created and written by Michael Ashton and Pam Valentine and ran on ITV over four series from 1977 to 1981.

It starred the incomparable Peggy Mount and Pat Coombs, two of our most talented and lamented character actresses.

Physically and characteristically opposites – they are a perfect match for the sitcom set in the ironically-named Paradise Lodge, a superior residence for retired gentlefolk.

Mount plays the formidable widow Flora Petty and Coombs, her mousy best friend Cissie Lupin, spinster of that parish.

As well as Mount and Coombs, the other regular members of the cast were Lally Bowers as the former theatrical artiste Dolly Love, over-fond of a tipple, and Diana King as the haughty Mildred Fanshaw.

From the very first episode, Stranger in Paradise, the sitcom set out its stall. Whatever the bossy Flora planned, mild-mannered Cissie inadvertently spoiled.

When a superior room becomes vacant, Flora has a plan to persuade owner Miss Milton to let her move in. She is innocently thwarted by kind-hearted Cissie.

In Raising the Roof, it is Cissie and her rendition of The Merry Peasant which takes centre stage away from Flora who plans to star in The Sound of Music.

It is Cissie who gets to hand a bouquet to the Queen despite Flora rigging the vote – and so on and so on.

Both Mount and Coombs played to stereotype. From The Larkins to the musical Oliver!, Mount, with her gruff, masculine voice and wel-padded figure, was known as a battleaxe. Like a galleon, she sailed through whatever she was in, pushing everyone out of the way by sheer force of personality and talent.

Contrastedly, the slim, soprano-voiced Coombs always played the downtrodden female comically under the thumb of stronger personalities – see Don’t Drink the Water.

It is credit to their skill, that they make the characters three-dimensional and lovable. In real life, the two women were friends and their joy in each other’s company is clear in the show – it is part of its charm.

Accomplished stage actress Bowers, her voice exuding sexiness, was also a stand-out as Dolly.

You’re Only Young Twice was unusual for its time as it stars were all women – with men relegated to guest roles.

The David Jason comedy Lucky Feller. It preceeded Only Fools and Horses, also started on Rewind. That’s a column to itself.