Quotes from Vera Lynn

When I started out, I was what they called corny. After a week in Nashville they were calling me hillbilly.

So many go into the business just to be famous, not because they are passionate about their craft.

Take each day as it comes and focus on the present moment.

I'm delighted people still enjoy my music all these years later.

Make up your mind what you want to do, and go and get it. Make sure it is not at the expense of anyone else, though.

When I left school at 14, I thought I had better get a job. I got one in a factory where I sewed on buttons. It was so boring and we weren't allowed to talk or sing. I lasted a day.

When I was 14 or 15, I was in a small troupe for teenagers, and I heard somebody say, 'Oh, she'll never get anywhere. She's too common.'

You can't have it all one way - be on the telly and the radio and make lots of money - and not offer anything to your followers when they need you.

The white cliffs of Dover are a significant landmark and it is so encouraging to know that they will now be protected for future generations.

I have always managed to combine my family life and my career, but there came a point when I had to choose between a career in America and my family. I chose my family.

It is so important that British children are taught about the World Wars that their great grandparents fought in and lived through. It was a terrifying time.

I am exceptionally fond of all the brave servicemen and women who have worked, and continue to work, to keep us safe and secure, and protect our values.

There was so little said about the Burmese war. The Forgotten 14th, they called them.

I don't know Robbie Williams. I know his name, but I've never met him.

I seem to have had quite a lot of pink dresses.

You can't do an awful lot about getting older but you shouldn't let it stop you from doing what you want to do.

People used me, in a way, to achieve something, and I was glad of it. I was just doing my job.

I was never the glamorous type like Betty Grable.

England, through good times or bad, was the only place I wanted to be.

When I look on my mantelpiece and see these cards wishing me a happy 100th birthday, I can't believe it.

I used to bomb around London in my little Austin 10 throughout the raids to appear on stage and if there was a raid before the show was over I would be there, crouching on a floor wherever I could find a big thick wall.

I went goodness knows how long without a bath.

I'm a girl from East Ham.

I think people looked at me as one of them - an ordinary girl from an ordinary family with a voice they could recognise.