Zoe Ball's true reaction to dad Johnny's verdict on 'bad marriage' to late mum

Former BBC Radio 2 presenter Zoe Ball's parents split when she was just two years old - and her TV presenter dad Johnny didn't hold back when divulging about his "bad marriage" in his tell-all autobiography in March, My Previous Life In Comedy. Now, in an exclusive interview with Express.co.uk, he has opened up on Zoe's very surprising reaction to how much he's made public.

He told us: "Zoe gave her blessing... she is with me all the way," adding that she's told him his autobiography "warms the cockles of her heart". Her support was valued, as writing about leaving the mother of his child had turned out to be the hardest part of completing the book. He confessed: "Getting my bad marriage done and on the page and over with [was a challenge]."

Johnny admitted: "There are lots of ups and downs and for every down I’ve come up again and it’s been fine. It’s when I’ve had to confront the downs that’s been a bit tedious."

His comments about Zoe's mum might have been brutally honest, especially when he admitted it was a "relief" to end the dysfunctional relationship, but he says his memoir would have been incomplete without them.

"I haven’t missed things out because they are miserable. I’ve put them in because they are part of the story. I had to put them in," he exclaimed.

"The marriage was washed up anyway when she said she was leaving me. It was the relief that I’d been waiting for and I hadn’t the sense to do it myself. It was a non marriage."

Johnny then remarried when Zoe was six, and has been with second wife Dianne for half a century. The couple are so happy that they sometimes "skip down the road like seven-year-olds" and believe that age is just a number.

Meanwhile, Johnny previously blamed his split with Julia for Zoe's own affair with DJ Dan Peppe while she was still married to ex-husband Norman Cook (Fatboy Slim), noting one crucial detail.

As previously reported in The Mirror, he claimed: "When she left for that silly DJ, I know exactly why that was. [Zoe and Norman’s son] Woody was exactly the same age as Zoe was when her mother left. She was thinking, ‘I’m like my mother, I’m going to let us all down.' It was a cry for help."

Zoe and Norman announced their split in 2016, but live very close to each other and successfully co-parent their son.