The thing I can't stand about this TV farrago is that it's an insult to Flora ("Laura") Thompson, nee Timms, who, in her late (and unhappy) years, wrote an extremely acute and sensitive memoir of her childhood and adolescence. The important point to make is that everybody in the books was a REAL person, not a yellow filtered mannequin. See extract from 1911 census (Flora was married by then).

Albert Timms, Head, 56, Married, Bricklayer, born Bucks Buckingham.

Emma Timms, Wife, 57, Married 36 yrs, 12 children, 6 surviving, 6 dead, born Oxon Ardley

Edwin Timms, Son, 31, Single, Farm Labourer, private army [pension?], born Oxon Cottisford - nb died in WW1

Frank Wallington Timms, Son, 22, Single, Farm Labourer, born Oxon Cottisford

What a filmic life they must all have led, nipping off to Candleford to hob nob with their betters over a latte, popping into the local Holland & Barretts and coming home in time to do the swingle ring round the maypole.

Referring specidically to Queenie - she was an old lady who kept bees; her dream was "A pound a week". She was married to a demented old man who tried to beat her with a strap and brandished knives.

Strangely enough the "Lark Rise" play, written by Keith Dewhurst, which started life at the Cottesloe and has subsequently been performed all over the place, is a far more successful bash at encapsulating Flora's book than the TV parody.