BBC star’s apology to Newsquest journalist live on air after 4 year wait for birthday card
A Newsquest journalist found herself on national radio after receiving a card from BBC presenter Greg James for her 30th birthday — four years late.
Newsquest’s regional audience and content editor for the north west Hannah Bysouth was invited onto Greg’s Radio 1 Breakfast show on December 15, so he could apologise about the ‘ludicrous’ situation of him being so far behind on opening post sent into the studio.
It all came about when Hannah’s sister Natalie Bargery contacted Greg in October 2016 asking him to sign a card for Hannah’s milestone birthday.
The letter said: “She listens to your show every day when driving home from work and runs into her house to get the radio switched on when she gets home.
“She particularly enjoys games like The Mayor of Where? and Pun Pong. She also donated a number of times when you were taking on the ‘Greg-athlon’.”
The surprise did not pan out and had long been forgotten about…until now.
Greg was more than happy to sign Hannah’s card — the only problem was he has only recently opened it, as he told his one million followers on Instagram.
He said: “For some reason (because I’m useless), your sister’s letter got lost for FOUR years.
“But here we are. It’s happening. Hope your 30th/31st/32nd/33rd birthdays were great.”
Between her 30th and the long wait for Greg’s card, Hannah has got married to former Warrington Guardian sports reporter Alex Bysouth, had her first child — Archie — and weathered a global pandemic.
Hannah, now 34, added: “It feels very 2020 to receive a birthday card four years late.
“I had a few messages from people telling me to check Greg James’ Instagram story.
“I saw it around 1am while I was feeding my little boy and woke up this morning thinking it must have been a weird dream!”
