Kay Mellor (née Daniel; 11 May 1951 – 15 May 2022) was an English actress, scriptwriter, producer and director. She was known for creating television shows such as ITV drama Fat Friends (2000–05), as well as co-creating CITV's children's drama Children's Ward (1989–2000). Early life Kay Daniel was born in Leeds on 11 May 1951 to a Catholic father, George, and a Jewish mother, Dinah. Her parents' marriage was unhappy, and Dinah suffered from George's domestic violence. She had an affair before seeking a divorce. She raised her children as a single parent in Ireland Wood and kept the affair a secret for more than 30 years. In 1967, Mellor become pregnant aged 16 and married the child's father, Anthony Mellor, who was 17. The couple had two daughters, television producer Yvonne Francas (born 1968) and actress Gaynor Faye (born 1971). When Mellor told her mother about being pregnant, she made her daughter promise to go back to her education later, should she get the chance. Mellor did so when her children were at school age, passing her O-levels and A-levels. She went on to Bretton Hall College and graduated with a BA Hons degree in 1983. Career As a writer, she began working for Granada Television in the 1980s, writing for the soap opera Coronation Street. In 1989, Mellor also wrote many episodes for the Channel 4 soap Brookside. She wrote for the anthology drama series Dramarama before co-creating the long-running children's drama Children's Ward with her Coronation Street colleague Paul Abbott in 1988. The series was awarded Best Children's Drama in the 1997 BAFTA Awards. She also created the soap opera Families which aired from 1990 until 1993, and wrote and starred in three series of the family show Just Us (1990–1994). She wrote the television drama serials Band of Gold (1995), Playing the Field (1998), Fat Friends (2000), Between the Sheets (2003), and Strictly Confidential (2006). Commenting on the casting for Fat Friends, Mellor said she had wanted genuinely large people to play the parts, calling Ruth Jones and James Corden "the real McCoy". Mellor had seen Corden in a Tango advert and asked her casting director Beverley Keogh to find him for her because she thought he was perfect for the part. In a parallel career as a television actress, Mellor appeared in her own adaptation of Jane Eyre (1997), and in other series and films