The Ex-Eastender has singing lessons in her musical theatre past but she's no pop star wannabe.
She may be much more synonymous with the east end of the capital, having played Zoe Slater in Eastenders for five years, until she bowed out in June, but Michelle Ryan was born and bred in North London. She still lives there and has returned there for her first post-Eastenders role, as Tiffany in the political satire Who's the Daddy?
The cool, deserted King's Head Theatre is a welcome respite from the bustle of Islington's Upper Street on a sweltering August afternoon, and it's also proved something of a different respite for the actress. 'I wanted to try comedy, after playing someone who screamed and cried for five years.'
Musical theatre overshadowed everything else when she was growing up and she admits that although she can't remember what her first record was 'it was probably something from Chicago or something'. While her friends might have had boy band posters on their walls, she was more likely to have posters of actors or from musicals.
She was in musical theatre from an early age and did have singing lessons at one stage to help her progress, but she's quick to stress that she never had any intentions of becoming a singer. 'No, definitely not, it's not what I'm passionate about. I love acting so I'll stick to that.'
But surely, being a young soap star with such a high profile - not least one with some singing experience (and one, her press cuttings reveal, who was voted above Britney Spears and Beyonce Knowles when she came fourth in FHM's Sexiest Women in the World 2005) - the offers must have come? 'Yeah, I have had the odd person saying "Listen, it would be great for you to do this."' she nods, 'but I'm like "No, it would be great for you if I did that, not for me"… No, I'll leave it to the professional singers.
None of Michelle's family ever played an instrument, but she recently bought an acoustic guitar and started to have lessons. 'I've always loved the guitar. You see Jimi Hendrix playing the guitar with his teeth, and OK, you know you're never going to be able to do that, but I always wanted to play an instrument of some sort.'
Has she stuck with it? 'I got halfway through the first book of classical guitar, but I just get too busy and put off the lessons.'
'But,' she reassures me, 'It's still lying around at home and I will go back to it.'
She didn't pick up any music influences from any of the other Eastenders in her five years there either. 'Some of the older actors liked all the classics like Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, but no one really had a passion for music.'
A lot of her musical tastes seem to have come through musical theatre and film. She's a fan of film soundtracks and her favourite song, if pushed is from Ennio Morricone's soundtrack of Once Upon A Time in America
If there was one genre she would really like to know it's jazz. 'I just don't know anything about jazz, really. I've never really listened to it, but I'd definitely like to discover more about it'.
