When the story broke that Exposure was going to be doing a story on Jimmy Savile, and that Newsnight had somehow suppressed it, I suggested to my editor, Tom Giles, that we should do something about it. Like any journalist I just wanted to know what on earth had gone on.
The story was moving so quickly we made the film in a week – it normally takes a month. We were unravelling the whole thing on the hoof and managed to gather a huge amount of information about what happened with Savile at the BBC over four decades. From the testimonies, some of the stories seem jawdropping. Our archive producer did an amazing job of unearthing powerful footage of Savile so we saw how overtly sexual he was, groping and leering at women on the programmes we all watched as children.
The most poignant was the group of cub scouts who appeared on Jim'll Fix It. The archive producer located footage of the boy I interviewed anonymously as a grown man. You could see the joy and happiness on his face as a nine-year-old during what should have been one of the biggest moments of his childhood, then he was molested shortly afterwards in Savile's dressing room. He was so ashamed he didn't tell anyone for 40 years.
I thought a lot of people would watch our investigation, but I didn't imagine that it would lead to a major revision of the BBC's position on everything. George Entwhisle's resignation as director general wasn't a direct result of our programme, but it doesn't feel good when somebody you've worked alongside for years is forced into that position.
We got quite a few emails after the film went out from people making new allegations about Jimmy Savile, about things that had happened on BBC premises, about other individuals, and we've passed all of that on to the police. But I don't think we, or anybody else, understood how widespread this was going to be and the momentum it would gather. It's an absolutely shocking story.
• This article was amended on Sunday 23 December 2012. The wording of the original headline implied Shelley Jofre broke the story, which is incorrect. This has now been corrected.
