There's votes in them thar soaps. The Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, poses with about eight of the soap stars who are here to enjoy a Granada TV party in the Great Room of the Shelbourne Hotel - four at each side of him, all smiling, happy. The Labour Party leader, Ruairi Quinn TD, is equally enamoured with the Coronation Street and Heartbeat actors. He stands with two of them and the photographers capture the moment. Snap.
Other politicians line up to have their picture taken with the cast members. A number of Emmerdale cast members are also present and in demand. Corrie's Maxine, who is Tracy Shaw in real life, is the most popular. Her screen husband, Ashley, played by Steven Arnold, is present, too, but almost forgotten in the rush to talk to the vivacious blonde, who gets married in real life in June to TV director Robert Ashworth. "And he's gorgeous," she says.
The three Duffy brothers (looking kind of like the Osmonds used to), from Crossmolina, Co Mayo, who sing, are at the party too. Producer Noel Pearson, another invitee, says he's currently working on a film called The Magnificat. It's about the first Irish pope (it's fiction, he adds helpfully), and his attempts to have Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1751) canonised. Richard Harris (as pope) and Michael Gambon (as a cardinal) will be in it.
Scotsman Charles Allen, who is chairman of Granada, is our host, throwing a party to celebrate the company's expanding involvement in Ireland's TV3 station. "From Wolverhampton to Waterford, it seems everyone loves Weatherfield," he says.
What about Albania? This is where actor Paul Kennedy, who is here in a red velvet suit, has spent the last two weeks, working for the children's charity, Cradle, doing slapstick. It's a country "where death comes knocking every day, the kids live in abject poverty", he says.
Others present at the Granada hooley include TV3 political correspondent Ursula Halligan, who chats to Susan Donovan, director of communications at Granada, who is an Artane woman originally. And Trevor Keegan, of AA Roadwatch, is here also. Listeners to radio: prepare to miss him because he's getting ready to work for the BBC in London from Easter. Well, hey, so long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu. Agus go neiri leat, a Threv.