Elizabeth

Liz is a CPN (Community Psychiatric Nurse), or CMHN (Community Mental Health Nurse) in the current terminology.

Compassionate and caring, Liz is aware that she cannot necessarily cure her patients, only help them manage their various conditions.

Liz's home life is far from perfect with her demanding kids and feckless husband, Don (Morgan Jones). Sometimes it gets frustrating and stressful. She tries not to let this show. She doesn't always succeed.

Graham Downes

An obese, mostly bed-ridden but cheerful man, who is infantilised by his mother (Rosie Cavaliero).

Food has created a relationship of absolute co-dependency between them. As a result they love and hate each other intensely. Most likely to say "More sugar puffs please mum!"

Ray

A long-forgotten Troggs-type rock star from the late Sixties/early Seventies. They had one massive album and a huge Christmas single that is a hit in Germany every year to this day.

He suffers from "post-nasal depression" as he calls it. He often has moments of manic clarity which are quickly followed by a deep, dark slump.

Billy

An agoraphobic, habitual criminal who has become institutionalised by prison and would really rather still be inside.

His mate Tony Beckton (Simon Day), pops round to bring him frozen offerings from Iceland and boxed sets of Game Of Thrones and the like, undoing Liz's efforts to help Billy leave the flat.

Herbert

An ageing rake, with a penchant for quoting Yeats and Dylan Thomas among others. He regularly corresponds with such luminaries as Milton and Ted Hughes and gets the occasional reply from beyond the grave, or so it seems to him.

Herbert takes his medication reluctantly, because it stops the voices that he claims keep him company. He likes the ladies!

Lorrie

A devout Christian, originally from Jamaica, who has a mutually dependent, dysfunctional relationship with her Jewish neighbour Maurice (Paul Whitehouse).

Maurice is helpful but over-attentive and would like to ask Lorrie out, but doesn't have the courage.

April

April sits immobile in her armchair. Her flat is over-run with cats and hasn't been cleaned for years. She doesn't notice the squalor and rarely leaves her flat.

Jack

Jack is an ex-soldier with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder after serving abroad in the Armed Forces.

He lives at home with his well-meaning but over-protective mum Sheila (Sue Elliot Nichols) and dad, David (Paul Whitehouse).

Phyllis

A Cockney octogenarian firmly in the grip of Alzheimer's who is very disappointed that her son, Gary (Paul Whitehouse) never comes to visit her, though he has moved in to look after her.

She puts her occasional nudity down to the "Turks across the road". In fact she believes almost everything bad in her life is the fault of the "Turks across the road".