ANDREA McLean has taken a brutal swipe at the Loose Women’s panelists while revealing why she dismissed working on the show.
The broadcaster, 54, branded the ladies “shouty” while speaking about why she initially turned a job with them down.
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Andrea eventually relented and ended up working on Loose Women for 13 years – but she refused to be a panelist.
Instead, Andrea agreed to head up the ITV daytime show as its anchor.
The star made her very frank admission while speaking on Giovanna Fletcher’s Happy Mum, Happy Baby Podcast.
Andrea was working at ITV’s breakfast show GMTV at the time and said she was approached for Loose Women on her first day back from maternity leave.
She revealed: “On the very first day I got a phone call saying, ‘Loose Women have been in touch would you like to work on that show?’.
“My first gut reaction was no. It was my agent that had rung me and I said, ‘No, absolutely not, that programme with the shouty ladies? I don’t want to go on that show’.”
Andrea continued: “I’d been on it once as a guest and I’d been terrified.
“And she was like, ‘No, no, they want you to be the anchor’ and I thought, ‘Oh I could do that, I could anchor’. I couldn’t just be a panelist.”
Andrea had not long since given birth to her daughter Amy when she made her Loose Women debut in 2007.
The Scottish journalist ended up spending 13 years anchoring the ITV1 panel show before making the shock announcement she was leaving.
Andrea broke down in tears in November 2020 as she told her co-stars and viewers at home the sad news.
The mum-of-two reflected on how she had suffered a nervous breakdown the previous year and insisted it was entirely her choice to quit.
Andrea, who made her announcement during the coronavirus pandemic, struggled to speak between sobs as she said: “So many people are talking about how they can’t wait for life to get back to normal and I sat and I thought, ‘Do I want my life to go back to the normal it was before?’
“Last year I had a nervous breakdown and what I felt was this year, collectively, the world had a breakdown and the experience I had means that this year I was mentally really strong to deal with everything that the pandemic threw at us.”
Regular Loose Women panellists
Katie Piper – Former Strictly Come Dancing star, activist, model and author
Sunetra Sarker – Also a former Strictly Come Dancing star, and known for acting in Casualty
Kaye Adams – Scottish journalist and one of the original Loose Women
Christine Lampard – ITV presenter
Ruth Langsford – Presented Loose Women on and off since 1999
Jane Moore – Former columnist for The Sun
Coleen Nolan – Became known for her family girl band called The Nolans and went on to compete on Celeb Big Brother
Nadia Sawalha – Former EastEnders star and Celebrity MasterChef winner
Stacey Solomon – Known for her reality show Sort Your Life Out and winning series 10 of I’m a Celeb
Janet Street-Porter – A journalist and president of the Ramblers’ Association
Brenda Edwards – Came fourth on the X Factor and went on to become a pop star and act in hit musicals such as Hairspray
Charlene White – Lead presenter at ITV News London
Kelly Bryan – Former EastEnders star and was in a girl group called Eternal alongside her sisters. Currently part of the cast of Hollyoaks
Frankie Bridge – Participated in Strictly Come Dancing and came third place on I’m A Celeb in 2021
Judi Love – A stand up comedian and radio presenter, who has also made a variety of TV appearances in shows such as Strictly Come Dancing, Celebrity MasterChef, and Taskmaster
Linda Robson – Played iconic character Tracey Stubbs in Birds of a Feather
Denise Welch – A soap queen, she starred in Coronation Street, Waterloo Road and Hollyoaks. Also the mother of Matty Healy, the lead singer of pop rock group the 1975.
Andrea continued: “But it made me stop and think, ‘What do I actually want?’ If there is anything that can show us you only get one life…
“‘Are you living it the way you want? Doing everything you want to do? Being brave and taking chances?’ And I realised, ‘No’.”
The star then became visibly choked up as she burst into tears, saying: “I didn’t think I was going to cry, but I’ll be leaving soon.”
Read more on the Scottish Sun
Since walking away from Loose Women, Andrea has trained to become a certified life coach.
She is, however, set to make a return to the show this month to celebrate its 25th anniversary.
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