Cilla Black: 'I would have won The X Factor' Cilla's Unswung Sixties focuses on the less glamorous side of the era, a side she only experienced for a short time before she was discovered by Beatles manager Brian Epstein at just 18. "I was a war baby," she says. I'd scrub floors for two ounces of boiled sweets which is probably why I'm a chocaholic now. My mother altered clothes for people and my father was a docker. In 1963, everything changed for me, but for the ordinary public, life went on. Doing this show made me realise how lucky I was. In the show, Black explains how, while she might have lived a Sixties dream, life was dull for most people - sex was still an awkward subject and most young people were getting married and toiling away in menial jobs, rather than whizzing along Brighton seafront on a Vespa. And, perhaps most depressingly of all, Ken Dodd was selling more records than the Rolling Stones. One significant aspect of the Sixties that Black remembers fondly is the fashion. "I have a lot of my old clothes in my loft - a Biba leather trench coat and a see-through dress that I used to wear a flesh underslip with to make me look nude," she recalls. I can't even get one leg into it now but I still go up to my loft like Miss Havisham and dream of fitting into those clothes again. Black worries about the younger generation of entertainers. "I didn't feel pressure to look a certain way," she says. People weren't as high maintenance. Girls now turn up on the red carpet in London in the middle of winter wearing next to nothing - no tights! I can't get over people wearing fake tan and the skimpiest of clothes. This is why I admire Adele - she lets her voice do the talking and doesn't conform to all these ideals. Black says she stays grounded by surrounding herself with family. "If [late husband] Bobby was alive today it would be him looking after me, but now it's our Robert," she says. I don't go to big showbiz events, although I was sad to miss the War Horse premiere. I was in Barbados. What a drag! Black spends a lot of time in Barbados - she has a house there, just down the road from Cliff Richard, who she coyly describes as "one of my closest friends." It's a leisurely life for semi-retired Black - she only takes on TV projects she's really interested in. "Anything which interferes with my social life is a no-no," she says. They've asked me to do Strictly Come Dancing and Dancing on Ice every year, but I'd die in rehearsals! The problem is, old people never win. And I'm used to winning. However, there is one big TV project that could tempt her off the sun-lounger. "I wouldn't mind being a talent show judge if it didn't run for too long," she says, "I don't know why Simon Cowell has never come calling - where are you Simon?" Good question - in the 1980s and "90s, when Blind Date and Surprise Surprise were huge hits, Black was arguably the most popular TV presenter in the country. "People ask me all the time if I'll bring Blind Date back," she says. But you couldn't do a show like that today, it would be too innocent. There was a bit of innunedo, but it was very tame compared to what we see now. Surprise Surprise, however, is rumoured to be returning to ITV1 this year, with Holly Willoughby tipped to take over Black's role. Black bumps into Simon Cowell in Barbados every year, though. So perhaps we will see her on the Britain's Got Talent panel after all - telling young wannabes off for not wearing tights. Cilla's Unswung Sixties is on the Yesterday channel on Monday 19 March at 9.00pm