HAVE you ever seen a good fat dancer?

There wasn’t any on Fame! as far as I can remember.

Some may say the character of Doris was a bit of a lumper, but what they mean is that she wasn’t a size 12 and had Curly Sue hair. In other words she wasn’t as nice looking as Coco or that one with the cello and flat hair who couldn’t sing.

So when it came to dance lessons, our Doris would make light of the fact that she couldn’t barrida with the thinnies and instead hop off to the canteen where she’d bounce on a table and belt out something or other about high-fidelity (high, high, high).

Then there was that blond bloke with the sousaphone, played by some nerdy FAT type who was a hated hall monitor.

Did we ever see him dance, in a school that was supposed to make its pupils masters and mistresses of all the art forms?

Did we hell. We only got to see him getting teased in the hallway and tell anyone who’d listen that a sousaphone isn’t a tuba. A fat instrument played by a fat kid who had no sense of humour.

I mean, talk about type casting.

I for one can’t dance. Sure, I can shake my arms around and make like I’m designing bricks or scratching my arm pits (as someone said, making like I’m bathing a rabid cat on the dance floor).

I don’t mind jiggling and wiggling about, but I think it’s a bit unsightly on me to be honest.

Like in most areas of my life, I’m too self-conscious and rely on comedy and quick wit to disguise it.

I move... my belly(s) goes the other way.

I go to the left and step to the right... my arse plays catch-up in the next room.

But I’m fabulous at the cakewalk. You get the picture.

Now I may not be so much a demon on the dance floor as someone who avoids any kind of activity done in public while wiggling, but I don’t think bigger people who have obviously got talent in this department should be stopped from doing it just because they have a lot going on in the chin department.

Which is why I think Arlene Phillips’s treatment of that bloke from Wales who didn’t get through on DanceX on Saturday was so unfair.

The cameras followed this big fella around – sorry, can’t remember his name – not because he was brilliant (he was), funny (not bad) or handsome (he did have something going on).

But because he stood out from all the rest. And why?

No, it wasn’t because he had Wonder Woman on his knickers or thought he was the love child of Michael Jackson and Carmen Miranda.

BECAUSE HE WAS A DANCING FAT PERSON.

And that, according to the show’s makers, singled him out as a “human interest” emotive story. Big wow.

I watched Arlene watch him and pull faces like she was sucking a gone-off lemon, knowing full well that for the type of group she had in mind his “look” wasn’t what she was after.

The poor dab was obviously deluded because he thought his dancing was enough to get him in the final dance off.

“Don’t judge me on this,” he said, making a sweeping motion with his hands over his face.

“Judge me on these,” and plié down to his feet. Yeah, as if the world only judges on talent alone. The thought is enough to put me off my breakfast. Then again...

Anyway, our pal’s card was marked from the outset because acid-tongued Arlene, the woman with a face like a 10lb trout (she’s a bitch, and I’m now in training to follow in her dainty footsteps), said in a recent interview that she’s inflexible about what kind of dancer she wants in her troupe.

Put it this way, she doesn’t want Dawn French in a tutu.

“I’m looking for gorgeous, unusual dancers,” she said.

“I think the most important thing is not only that they can dance but also that they’re physically fit.

“I’m afraid I’m not flexible about size and shape.

“I’m so politically incorrect that the producers have struggled to keep me from shouting out about people’s size.”

So what would she bellow, given the chance?

“Britain, you’re overweight.

“It’s also about lack of strength. I don’t mind if somebody’s big, so long as they’re strong and their muscles are toned. But some of them look like puddings.”

I don’t know about you, but I’ve never met a pudding I don’t like.

Only the skinny ones with no filling or substance.