Kirsten Lindsey O'Brien (born 23 February 1972) is an English television presenter and actress. She is perhaps best known for her work presenting for the BBC, including the popular CBBC art programme SMart from 1999 to 2009, and CBeebies pre-school art spin-off programme SMarteenies in 2002. Career O'Brien studied media and communications at the University of Central England in Birmingham, graduating in 1993. She got her first broadcast experience on the university's student radio station which led to her first job in 1995 at Tyne Tees Television where she made her presenting debut on a children's science programme. In 1996 she joined the team presenting the continuity links during the BBC's children's programming CBBC. She stayed there for three-and-a-half years during which time she became best known for her partnership with puppet Otis the Aardvark. Both O'Brien and Otis also co-presented with other people (and often solo). The 1997 Saturday morning spin-off Saturday Aardvark was entirely built around them. Puppeteer Dave Chapman would often reduce O'Brien to tears of helpless laughter with his ad-libs. O'Brien left the CBBC on-air presentation team in 1999 but is still a regular on children's TV and radio. She has co-hosted SMart and its spin-offs SMart on the Road and SMarteenies (for the pre-school CBeebies channel). On radio she was one of the presenters of BBC 7's Little Toe Radio Show. In 2004 she played Peter Pan in pantomime. The same year O'Brien successfully took part in a lumberjack competition for the BBC series Bring It On. She performed a sketch show during the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2006 entitled Lesley's Lunch Hour - Not During Lunch, And Not Quite An Hour along with double act partner Ruth Bratt. Then in 2007 she took her comedy show Kirsten O'Brien - Confessions of a Children's TV Presenter to Edinburgh. Between 28 May and 15 June 2007, she co-presented Springwatch Trackers alongside Steve Backshall. Transmitted live on BBC Two from a farm in Devon and repeated later in the day on the CBBC Channel the show featured teams of boys and girls who were set a series of Tracker challenges. She has been a guest on Stephen Merchant's on BBC Radio 6 Music, Through the Keyhole and several times on Rob Brydon's Annually Retentive. O'Brien filmed Kirsten's Topless Ambition, a documentary for BBC3 that aired on 28 April 2009, in which she was "facing a huge decision