All my days were radio days

When I was about seven or eight I became fascinated with the whole scene of radio and I knew that's what I wanted to do. I'm sure there were thousands of people who went through the same thing and they weren't as lucky as I was, but throughout my school years I really believed that I was going to be on the radio.

I used to make up and record little radio shows when I was a child. The best Christmas present I ever got from Santa Claus was a tape recorder with a microphone - I used it every day and I used to record little tapes and jingles, so I suppose it was always on the cards, in a way.

I went to Belvedere College in Denmark Street in the centre of Dublin, from about fourth or fifth class, so I was there for a bit of primary and all of secondary. My brother had already gone there so there was a pair of us in it.

I must say I loved school. I know people always say that they're the best days of your life. Even in secondary, I enjoyed going to school. I wasn't brilliant at it or anything like that, but I enjoyed the social aspect of the whole thing.

Belvedere was a very good school. They gave you the freedom to develop your interests and go in the direction you wanted to go, rather than pigeon-holing everybody and saying, "you have to be a doctor" or "you have to be an accountant".

We had a great principal in Belvedere called Jimmy Gough and he was a real straight talker. A Dubliner, he used to slag me about the radio thing. He would say that I was wasting my time, but he was saying it in a way that he wasn't going to try and change my mind about it. He was supportive in a funny, slagging kind of way. He gave me the freedom to go ahead and do what I wanted to do. Most of the teachers there let me try the radio out and gave me space and I appreciate them for that.

I used to get great marks for English essays and coming up with ideas and I was good at languages, but I hated history and I wasn't great at maths. I didn't have an ordered mind. But I think that the things I did well in kind of led me in the direction of what I'm doing now.

When I was 16, during my school holidays, I started working in a radio station; then at weekends and some early mornings when I went back to school. I have to admit I left exams to go and do radio shows, but I suppose when you end up doing what I do it was probably an education in itself.

The station I was working for at the time I did my leaving was ARD in Belvedere Place, which was handy because it was just down the road from Belvedere School, so I didn't have to go that far.

I left one of my Leaving Cert exams to go on the radio. I knew I wasn't getting anywhere with the test and I had to be on at half four and it was one of the afternoon exams, so I left to prepare myself for the show.

I think it was biology and I wasn't that great at it. I wasn't going to do particularly well, so I made a decision - which is more important, doing well in radio or doing badly in biology? I decided doing well in radio was probably better, so I left. I did sit most of the Leaving Cert though and I got on all right.

My heart was set on going into the workplace directly and I had no real interest in third level. Maybe if I did it all over again I would look towards doing a third-level course, but I really wanted to just get involved in the radio. In a way it's one regret that I would have that I didn't keep going and study something else, but it's worked out fine, touch wood.

In conversation with Olivia Kelly