I recently had the honour of performing at Denise Welch's Magic Castle Charity Ball at the Principal Hotel in Manchester.

The event, organised by event specialists Entertainment Today, was in aid of the Gem Appeal and was supported by Barclays.

The Gem Appeal, who have recently received the Queen's Award for Voluntary Service, is a fantastic charity that Denise Welch is proudly a patron of.

It was founded in 1994 by Karen Johnson after she was approached by consultant paediatrician Dr Ed Wraith with a request for money to be raised to hopefully extend the Willink Unit at the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital and to fund research into the disorder that Karen's two sons Simon and Mike were dying from.

At the time there was no treatment for children diagnosed with these rare genetic disorders and inborn errors of metabolism and little research was being done.

The charity has gone from strength to strength and despite reaching a magnificent fundraising target of £3 million in 2018 there are still important targets to reach so that more advances can be made in both treating and eventually curing genetic diseases in children and the Denise Welch Magic Castle Ball helps enormously in raising these much needed funds.

I was extremely proud to play my small part in this and get the night started with my set of Sinatra and the Rat Pack classics, as magicians walked around the audience mesmerising guests with their sleight of hand tricks.

As guests were seated for dinner, Destiny Choir took to the stage with their fantastic performance.

Kate Thornton was host for the evening and Christopher Biggins was the events auctioneer.

He had some amazing prizes to auction including an ultimate Formula One party experience at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix 2019, a three hour flight experience around the Northern Lights and a red carpet film experience with the stars.

There was a whole host of celebrity guests in attendance including Saira Kahn, Nadia Sawalha, Kate Thornton, Jane Moore and Andrea McLean (pictured) as well as Jenny Powell, Jane Danson, Sue Cleaver, 'Judge Rinder', Isla Traquair, Christopher Taylor from Love Island and my good friends the Malone family from Gogglebox.

Always a pleasure to see them all.

I was very proud to have been asked to perform at this prestigious event and I look forward to the next one.

See you next week!