I'd written a book of short stories that had won the Somerset Maugham prize so I was respectable, but there was no money in short story writing.
I always put humour into my stories because if you construct a horrific scene of some kind you have to balance that with an equal quantity of humour.
All stories should have some honesty and truth in them, otherwise you're just playing about.
I made a rule for myself that the only television things I would do would be my own stories.
I wanted to write a story that demanded the viewer's attention.