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The 55-year-old mother-of-two was working as a well-paid personal assistant when she was made redundant in 1999.

She said: "I was shocked to lose my job but ultimately I'm glad it happened. I made the most of the opportunity. I had already been doing my own family history and decided to do an Open University course in family history, then I heard the Workers' Educational Association needed tutors."

She earned herself the nickname 'The Hat Lady' when she attended a family history fair at York. Jackie fashioned herself a hat with a genealogy theme using a branch and some homemade leaves.

She said: "When I told my students I was going to York racecourse the week after Ladies' Day they said you must have a hat, so I went to Oxfam in Ilkley, stuck a bit of old privet in there and hung labels with occupations and sources. The hat later got me 58,000 hits on the internet – more than the experts!"

She said: "I enjoy family history because I can help people make sense of their past. It can be exciting, for example to find out you are related to royalty but it can also be sad: one woman I was teaching discovered a picture of one of her relatives, a girl in the 1920s, who looked all dressed up as if she was going out on the town, but then found out she died in a bus crash.

"The one thing I could not live without is my old family papers. We were flooded once and that was the first thing I checked. That and the old pictures.

"My first job was as a clerical assistant for Pudsey College when I was 18. That was in about 1971 and I did that for two years.

"I am most proud of what I have achieved in my second career and being successful in something I have done mostly myself.

"The best thing about Leeds is that my family were part of it's development in that I have relatives who provided the carpet for the town hall when it opened for Queen Victoria's visit. You might say that while my family is not directly connected to royalty, we've been walked on by royalty! It's nice to think my own family helped in the development of such an important city.

"To relax I do my family history, or sit in the garden to just chill out.

"I had a very content childhood. I grew up in Fulneck, which is an unusual place. It was built as a Moravian settlement in the 1740s and it's a tranquil oasis. I used to play golf a lot as a child.

"The best piece of advice I ever received was from a lady called Ruth Strong, who advised me to go for the family history course.

"If I could meet anyone living or dead it would have to be the builder of our house to ask him why he didn't build the foundations better! He was a distant relative of mine, called John Dawson, a butcher. John's grandson married my great grandmother's sister – work that one out. I'd like to know his ideas and aspirations about why he built it in this style. It was built as a butcher's and dwelling house in 1820.

"My philosophy on life is if you want to do something, then have a go, don't wait around.

"A fact which might surprise people is I have won competition medals for Ballroom and Latin dancing. In 1975 I won the bronze for ballroom dancing at Pudsey Civic Hall. I still like to dance today.

"I don't really do jokes as such but I do like to let the humour of a situation come through and be spontaneous. That's the best form of humour. I'm not very good at delivering punchlines.

"I can remember my first kiss: I was 16 and it was in Bradford Bus Station and that's all I'm saying!"

* Jackie Depelle runs a series of courses on learning how to trace family history across West Yorkshire.
She also runs the yourfairladies.ning.com website with friend Anne Griffin organising family history fairs.

* Ring Jackie on (0113) 2360253 or email: depellejg@aol.com for more details.