Bill Roache on Corrie Street and the great beyond

British actor William Roach, who plays Ken Barlow, is shown on the Coronation Street set in Manchester in 2005. (Reuters)

I spent last Saturday afternoon with Coronation Street's Ken Barlow. Actually it was with William Roache, who plays Ken on the soap. And to be fair, I wasn't alone with him. I was in Toronto's Winter Garden Theatre where he made a stop on his Canadian tour.

The theatre was packed with Corrie fans. We were all there to see "The Man."

Ken is the world's longest serving soap opera character. Roache has been playing Barlow for more than 51 years. Ken has been married four times and has dated 27 women and has a reputation as a lothario.

There was so much I wanted to know. So many details about his life on the Cobbles that I was anxious to find out about.

He spoke of his love of theatre. He paid tribute to his on-screen mother-in-law Blanche Hunt, who, alas, is no longer with us. He suggested that one or two of his colleagues had undergone plastic surgery (hello Rita). For the record, William Roache, has never gone under the knife.

And guess what? The beer the cast drinks in the Rovers is not real.

Probably a good thing. They spend so much time in the pub on the show that if they were drinking real beer the entire cast would be intoxicated day in and day out.

None of that surprised me. The 'big reveal' came not from the set of Corrie, but from the experience of the man who has spent a lot of time on the set. William Roache has had four psychic episodes. He has seen ghosts. He has received messages from the great beyond. And when Bill Roache spoke about that, his 79-year-old face lit up. He looked like a much younger man for that moment. And his passion for the subject was clear.

I had been hoping for insight into Ken and Deirdre's relationship. What I got was a glimpse of a man who believes passionately in the possibility of the unknown, and who is way more interesting than the character he plays.

And I wasn't expecting that during my afternoon with Ken Barlow.

-- Sian Jones