Annabel Port (born 12 March 1975,

Southend-on-Sea Southend-on-Sea (), commonly referred to as Southend (), is a coastal city and unitary authority area with borough status in southeastern Essex, England. It lies on the north side of the Thames Estuary, east of central London. It is bordered ...

) is a British radio presenter. She was the co-presenter of Geoff Lloyd with Annabel Port on

Absolute Radio Absolute Radio is a British National radio station owned and operated by Bauer as part of the Absolute Radio Network. It broadcasts nationally across the UK via Digital audio broadcasting and on 1215 kHz MW. History 1993–1997: Virg ...

from 2008 until the show ended on 12 April 2017. Previously, she has worked on

The Geoff Show ''The Geoff Show'' was a humorous radio program, broadcast on Absolute Radio (formerly Virgin Radio) from 3 January 2006 to 25 September 2008. The show ran for three hours, between 10pm and 1am, Monday to Thursday. Presented by Geoff Lloyd, it ...

and read travel reports on the

Pete and Geoff The duo of Pete and Geoff were DJs Pete Mitchell and Geoff Lloyd, who from January 2003 to December 2005 hosted the breakfast show on Virgin Radio. In the early 1980s, Mitchell was an aspiring musician who moved into management and production. ...

Breakfast Show which she hosted along with Lloyd and Pete Mitchell before the latter's departure in December 2005. On 9 May 2011 she won a Gold Sony Radio Award for Best On-Air Contributor.

Early life and career

Annabel Port was educated at

Westcliff High School for Girls Westcliff High School for Girls, also known by its initialism WHSG, is a selective grammar school and academy for girls in Southend-on-Sea, Essex and surrounding areas. It teaches students from the age of 11 through to 18 years old, and admission ...

and

Oxford Brookes University Oxford Brookes University (formerly known as Oxford Polytechnic (United Kingdom), Polytechnic) is a public university, public university in Oxford, England. It is a new university, having received university status through the Further and High ...

. Prior to working in radio, she taught

ESL English as a second or foreign language is the use of English by speakers with different native languages. Language education for people learning English may be known as English as a second language (ESL), English as a foreign language (EFL ...

Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in Ce ...

and

Mexicans Mexicans ( es, mexicanos) are the citizens of the United Mexican States. The most spoken language by Mexicans is Spanish language, Spanish, but some may also speak languages from 68 different Languages of Mexico, Indigenous linguistic groups ...

for three years, spent six months doing data input, one week cleaning an old people's home and to her knowledge holds the national record for the 6 years she held a paper round (until the unusually mature age of 18). Port is a former presenter of Whipps Cross Hospital Radio.

Broadcasting career

Virgin Radio

On 14 January 2001 she came to

Virgin Radio Virgin Radio launched in the United Kingdom in 1993. In 2008, Virgin Radio UK was sold to TIML, a subsidiary of The Times of India group, and the name was changed to Absolute Radio; the Virgin Radio name was not included in the sale. In 2001, ...

on a work experience placement and was spotted by Lloyd. Since then she has auditioned to be

Michael Hutchence Michael Kelland John Hutchence (22 January 1960 – 22 November 1997) was an Australian musician, singer-songwriter and actor. Hutchence co-founded the rock band INXS, which sold over 75 million records worldwide and was inducted into th ...

's replacement in INXS and has been to

circus A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclist ...

school. In a show broadcast on 9 September 2005, Sir

Paul McCartney Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained worldwide fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John Lennon. One ...

assisted her in completing a song about beef tomatoes. Port worked on the late night show

from its inception in January 2006 until it ended in September 2008, and devised and presented a number of radio features, including "Porting Controversy", as well as a velvety broadcast voice on the infamous "Dirty Book At Bedtime". Before 'The Geoff Show', Port also presented features on the Virgin Radio Breakfast Show, which included "Annabel's Animals" where Geoff was asked to guess the identity of animals brought to the studio by local zoos. A more regular feature was "Annabel's Friday Song". This is where the aforementioned tomato song with Sir Paul McCartney was aired. This feature is now occasionally resurrected on 'The Geoff Show' when the show does a podcast only show, albeit a "bawdy" song not fit for broadcast on UK radio. "Annabel's Friday Song" was usually a short, comical song introducing the coming weekend, with varying topical verses played live by Annabel. The song was introduced as coming "From the golden throat of miss Annabel Port". ''Chorus''
Oh what does it mean when the pubs are all packed at five-thirty?
Oh what does it mean when we're all having fish for our tea?
Oh what does it mean when Top of the Pops is on the telly?
Oh yes, the weekend's nearly here;
So sing along with meeee-ee hee hee...

Absolute Radio

On 29 September 2008, Port moved along with the rest of the team to Geoff Lloyd's Hometime Show. On 9 May 2011 she won a Gold Sony Radio Award for Best On-Air Contributor, beating, among others,

Moira Stuart Moira Clare Ruby Stuart, (born 2 September 1949) is a British presenter and broadcaster. She was the first female newsreader of Caribbean heritage to appear on British national television, having worked on BBC News since 1981.Mark Kermode Mark James Patrick Kermode (, ; ; born 2 July 1963) is an English film critic, musician, radio presenter, television presenter and podcaster. He is the chief film critic for ''The Observer'', contributes to the magazine ''Sight & Sound'', prese ...

. Annabel Port is the author of the music and lyrics of the Dead Dog Memorial Song. The song arose out of a show feature dedicated to listeners' dead dogs; Annabel was set the task of writing a memorial to those dogs. On 15 July 2013 Annabel revealed to the world the Dead Dog Memorial Song on Geoff Lloyd's Hometime Show. The song was then recorded by the band

The Boy Least Likely To The Boy Least Likely To is an English indie pop duo, composed of composer/multi-instrumentalist Pete Hobbs and lyricist/singer Jof Owen. History Owen and Hobbs both grew up in the village of Wendover in Buckinghamshire. After meeting at schoo ...

and released on The Hometime Show on 18 July 2013. Profits from the Dead Dog Memorial Song go the

Dogs Trust Dogs Trust, known until 2003 as the National Canine Defence League, is a British animal welfare charity and humane society which specialises in the well-being of dogs. It is the largest dog welfare charity in the United Kingdom, caring for ove ...

charity.

Other work

In August 2017, Annabel began co-hosting a podcast with her former Absolute Radio co-host Geoff Lloyd called ''Adrift''. In April 2018, her first book, ''Annabel vs. The Internet'', was published. The book is based on a feature of the same name from the old Hometime radio show in which Geoff would set weekly challenges for her. Since September 2020, Annabel has been the editor o
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References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Port, Annabel Living people Absolute Radio British radio personalities 1975 births Alumni of Oxford Brookes University People educated at Westcliff High School for Girls People from Southend-on-Sea