"THE other night, at about 11.30pm, I was in a local kebab shop and a couple of lads came in, pointed at me, and said 'You were the horse!'"

Actor Alan Blyton is now in his sixth play at Basingstoke's Haymarket Theatre, and although he created quite a few memorable characters, his horse in The Three Musketeers is the one people most remember.

"Creating the horse was fairly easy. I didn't have a panto-type skin, but I had this mad hat with the ears sticking out," he said.

"I added in some facial bits, as if chewing grass and blowing out my lips and making whinny noises

"I treated him more like a human character than an animal. It was a lot of fun."

He also enjoyed playing in the thriller Therese Raquin.

"I really loved hearing the audience jump - getting a scream is as good as getting a laugh.

"I think comedy and horror are my two favourite genres because of that audible audience reaction."

Alan was also responsible for creating what was arguably the most irritating character ever seen on the Haymarket stage - Reg with the braying laugh in the two Norman Conquest plays.

"It had to be a signature laugh and it really worried me when I was working on it. Reg's laugh was not humorous but nervous," said Alan.

"He was on a knife edge and when he lost his temper, he did so in a big way."

Most actors start their acting career by appearing in school plays, but for Alan, films were the turn-on.

He said: "I wanted to be an actor in films - but I haven't been in any yet. Not the big cinema productions. I'm still hoping."

But he and a friend raised £10,000 to hire the professional equipment to make six 16mm short, colour films.

He explained: "They were like live action cartoons, sort of in Benny Hill style. They were sold all around the world. I'm very big in Azerbaijan!"

But a cable television company, Live TV, liked what they were doing and hired them as resident writers and actors. "It was sort of tabloid telly," said Alan. "If we had a silly idea they would tell us to go ahead and do it. We spent two years there."

During that time, he was in a few fringe shows in London, and a tour of Merchant of Venice. Alan might have become a farmer like his dad, but an allergy to corn dust put paid to that idea - and so he became an actor.

Now he's in Basingstoke creating another crazy character in the Brian Friel farce The Communication Cord.

"I'm a German, with the Irish nickname Barney the Banks, living in a caravan," he revealed.

"He's a bit of an innocent abroad. He keeps putting his foot in it and once the whole farcical element gets going, with everyone pretending to be somebody else, Barney is soon totally out of his depth.

"It starts with one little lie which spirals out of control. Everyone just gets in deeper and deeper. It's pure farce."

The Communication Cord is the second play in the Haymarket's Irish Season, and runs from this Thursday until November 6.

Tickets are available from the box office on 0870 770 1088.