Rob Fennah, writer of smash hit musical Twopence To Cross the Mersey, charts the show’s success with Laura Davis

GIVEN the honoured place the musical has been granted in people’s hearts, it’s interesting to hear Twopence To Cross the Mersey’s writer describe its inception as a series of coincidences.

If he hadn’t been waiting to go into a meeting at a particular time on a particular day, and if the receptionist in the office where that particular meeting was being held hadn’t been reading a particular book, then the show wouldn’t have just topped £2m at the box office.

That book was Helen Forrester’s best-selling memoir and Fennah was halfway through it by the time his appointment began.

“The secretary said ‘you’re from Liverpool, aren’t you’. And she lent me the book to pass the time,” he recalls.

“There was a line in it where she describes her father as ‘a butterfly with wings beaten useless by the rain’, which I thought was a great image, so I wrote a song with my brother using that line.”

The second coincidence was that one of the playwright’s friends was hosting a “meet the author” event with Forrester as the star guest.

He was looking for someone to entertain the guests and Fennah, a well-established musician, suggested performing his song.

Forrester loved it and asked if she could use a recording when giving radio interviews around the world.