GROUND Force star Charlie Dimmock gave a green-fingered Gillingham woman the experience of a lifetime when she visited to help with the garden.

Charlie offered Anne Heather, 58, of Hamelin Road, Gillingham, advice on the kind of plants that would work best in different areas and they went to a garden centre together.

Charlie visited after Anne won a learndirect competition, whose other prizes included masterclasses with chef Antony Worrall Thompson and Charlie's Ground Force colleague Tommy Walsh.

Semi-retired Anne said: "When I heard I had won, I thought I was going to be in a class of 20 people, and I would have to go somewhere else. Then they told me Charlie would be coming to our house and I couldn't believe it.

"It has been absolutely wonderful. It's the wrong time of the year, really, for too much gardening, but we went around the garden.

"I showed Charlie the area where we would like to build a shrubbery down at the bottom and we spent a lot of time in the greenhouse."

Charlie told Anne the kind of plants that would be suitable for her soil and they went to nearby Elm Court Garden Centre.