Next week an old friend of Leanne Battersby arrives on Coronation Street - and the actress who plays her may be familiar to fans of sister soap Emmerdale.
Kirsty Hitchinson has acted from a young age, starting out at Oldham Theatre Workshop with tutor David Johnson, who gave the late Anne Kirkbride, Corrie's Deirdre Barlow, her big break.
Kirsty studied drama at the University of Huddersfield and trained in Manchester and London.
Over the years she has worked on TV programmes including the supernatural drama Bedlam and BBC2's Close to the Enemy.
Most recently Kirsty played Julia in the Netflix series Safe and last year she played Ariana in Emmerdale, a glamorous date for Jai Sharma played by Chris Bisson.
Businessmen Jai met Ariana after he started using a dating app to find the woman of his dreams.
London-based Kirsty, from Oldham, is also on the books with Boss Model Management and MOT Models.
In Corrie her character Mandy, who mum Leanne knows from her antenatal class, asks after her son Oliver.
A devastated Leanne, who was recently told that her boy has a serious life limiting condition, makes out he's fine. But as Mandy heads off, Leanne is overwhelmed with grief.
She then in Toyah how when her old friend inquired after Oliver, she lied, and now she’s ashamed of herself.
Toyah’s heart breaks for her sister, but Leanne urges her to set the wheels in motion to become a foster parent as she deserves some happiness.
