Quotes from Miranda Hart

I have always thought of comedy as an important job and medium, and so I put pressure on myself to do the best I can.

The main reason I got into comedy was in the hope that I could make a few people laugh and feel better about life, and the fact that I do that is quite overwhelming, really.

No one likes a show-off, but if parallel parking was an Olympic sport, I would get gold, no probs.

When my sitcom 'Miranda' first became successful, I was so in the thick of working and I was so stressed that I didn't really enjoy the moment. You suddenly look back and go, 'Gosh, you've just got to enjoy every day.' And now I wake up and literally pinch myself every day.

I wanted to be a farmer's wife. I thought it would be quite fun to wake up of a morning, collect eggs and have sheep and pigs as pets. I know now that it would also involve having to sleep with the farmer, but at the time I wasn't thinking about the sexual implications - I was 11.

I absolutely don't write for women - far, far from it. It's so not what I want to do. Some of the writers, who have helped out at the beginning and end of the process - they're all men - have suggested quite feminine subjects they want me to explore. And I'm always, simply, 'No.' I don't want to do diets, don't want to. I just can't do it.

Pessimism is my default setting.

The embarrassment of a situation can, once you are over it, be the funniest time in your life. And I suppose a lot of my comedy comes from painful moments or experiences in life, and you just flip them on their head.

If I had had plastic surgery, I would have asked for something better than the face you are seeing! I actually really hate plastic surgery when it's just for aesthetics and anti-ageing. I think ageing is beautiful and expressive and characterful.

I'm not saying writing comedy's brain surgery, but there is a certain pressure to it. It's the equivalent of doing homework that's going to end up on national television.

I'll always have to force myself to see the positive, because I'm wired badly, I'd say. I'm just naturally a bit under, a bit depressed.

If I did better... I'd be God.

I don't know who St. Valentine was, but I hope he died alone, surrounded by couples.

I suppose you want me to say I'm at parties all the time and am secretly going out with Tom Cruise, but I am afraid that is not the case. I'm still in my pyjamas at nine o'clock each night, watching ITV2 without telling anyone.

My greatest crush was Chandler from 'Friends.' And Goran Ivanisevic.

I'd like someone tall, dark and nice. Independent and confident. Not a macho man. Perhaps a little bit girly, in a way. The key for me is if we can cry with laughter.

Being tall is very good for reaching high shelves and seeing in a crowd. Sadly, it has also given me the inability to dance. There's too much of me to look neat, which is most disappointing.

I think there are different kinds of comedians, and I prefer the clowns who are going: 'I'm an idiot, aren't we all a bit like this, laugh at me.' Whereas, a lot of other comedians are saying: 'Aren't I clever? You want to be me, aren't I cool? Revere me.' Which is fine. But that's not my bag.

I spent my childhood clad in 1970s hand-me-downs, primarily from male cousins, which mainly consisted of a selection of beige, brown and orange dungarees. That, combined with a perfectly round pudding-bowl haircut, made me look, on a good day, like a cross between Ann Widdecombe, one of the Flower Pot Men, and a monk.

Life is a series of embarrassing moments which leave you feeling alone in your confusion and shame

You need to know that even as life develops in superficially disappointing ways, there is still fun to be had.

My whole family is obsessed by brandy butter. And bread sauce. Then, of course, there will be a lot of wind in the afternoon! We have never disguised the wind side of our lives as a family; we think it's hilarious.

People come up to me and say, 'Can I just thank you for writing my life?' And I reply, 'I'm glad someone else is as idiotic as I am.'

I want to be more physical and theatrical within the stand-up. There might be dance moments, and people better watch out - I will gallop.