WHEN budding Bolton actress Bryony-Anne Anderson was given time off school for a television role it landed her right back where she started -- in the classroom.

But this time it was one of the nation's best known classrooms on the set of the brand new series of the smash Granada comedy-drama The Grimleys.

Multi-talented Bryony-Anne, 14, is no stranger to the world of showbiz, she has been dancing since the age of two and has already appeared on television in an episode of Cops as an extra.

And when her theatrical agency, Manchester-based Laines, told her she had landed a part in The Grimleys she was overjoyed. Over the past few weeks Bryony-Anne has been rubbing shoulders with the show's stars Brian Conley, Amanda Holden and Noddy Holder two days a week during filming at a secret location in Manchester.

"They are really lovely people and very friendly and down to earth," she said. "They mix with the rest of us and are just like part of the group really."

Bryony, a product of the Bolton Academy of Dance and Stage, plays a schoolgirl in Class 5C the same class a Darren Grimley - Gordon Grimley's younger brother. "We have lines to say as a class and we can all be seen in the scenes with Darren in the classroom," said Thornleigh Saleisan College pupil Bryony. "All my friends at school in Bolton are really pleased for me and they are all big fans of The Grimleys so the biggest problem has been not telling them what happens in the new series because it is a secret."

Now Bryony-Anne has her sights set on the stars and would and is hoping for a career on the stage in the future.

But her proud family mum Amanda, dad Stephen and younger brother Dominic of Rose Lea, Horwich, are making sure she keeps her feet on the ground.

"She has always wanted to be an actress and her part in The Grimleys is useful work experience for the future," said mum Amanda. "It sounds strange but Bryony-Anne has said that if the acting doesn't work out then she wants to be an archaeologist so next time she might try work experience in a museum."

Bryony-Anne can be seen in The Grimleys when it returns to Granada early in the New Year.