Annette Mills (born Edith Mabel Mills; 10 September 1894 – 10 January 1955) was an English actress, dancer, songwriter and television presenter, best known for presenting the children's television show Muffin the Mule. Biography Early life She was born in Wandsworth, London, the daughter of teacher Lewis Mills and his wife Edith. She grew up in Belton, near Great Yarmouth, where her father became a headteacher, and studied in King's Lynn and Norwich before studying the piano and organ at the Royal Academy of Music. She intended becoming a concert pianist, but, after her fiancé was killed in action, she married, had a daughter, and worked as a dancing teacher in Notting Hill. Dancer and songwriter After meeting dancer Robert Sielle (born Cecil Leon Roberts), they formed a dancing partnership. They put on exhibition dances, had a residency at the Piccadilly Hotel, and after a visit to the United States were credited with introducing the Charleston to Britain in 1925. Mills and Sielle married, but were later divorced. They continued to perform together until Mills was forced to give up dancing, after breaking her leg on stage in Cape Town. Instead, she turned her hand to songwriting and singing, and began to appear regularly as an entertainer on BBC Radio, singing light comedy songs and accompanying other singers on the piano. She wrote "A Feather in Her Tyrolean Hat", recorded by Gracie Fields in 1936, and wrote and sang the novelty dance song "Boomps a-Daisy", recording it with the Joe Loss Orchestra in 1939. She also composed "Adolf", sung by Arthur Askey in the 1940 film Band Waggon. She appeared in cabarets and revues in London and Paris, and wrote the music and lyrics for C. B. Cochran's shows. In 1942, during the Second World War, she was on her way back from entertaining troops in France when she was involved in a serious car accident, which left her hospitalised for the next two years. She wrote short stories and plays during the period, some of which were broadcast. Her comic play Rotten Row was later televised. "Muffin the Mule" She made her first BBC Television appearance in June 1946, as a singer, pianist and story teller on For the Children. She suggested that the top of her piano could be used as a stage for puppets to illustrate her stories, and a disused marionette of a mule, whom she