Anne Charleston at the Neighbours Turns 30 celebration evening at Café de Paris, London. Photo: Yui Mok/PA Wire

Past and present stars of the popular Australian Neighbours attended a party at the Café de Paris in London to celebrate the show’s 30th anniversary.

Charleston, Stefan Dennis, Tim Phillipps and Olympia Valance were among the cast who flew over from Down Under especially to celebrate with British fans of the show, as well as former cast members Mark Little and Holly Valance.

Neighbours star Anne Charleston has admitted she was “dubious” about returning to the soap, because of the elaborate way her character had been written back in.

Charleston, 72, played no-nonsense coffee shop owner Madge Bishop for 13 years in the soap, until her character died of cancer in 2001. Madge is returning for the 30th anniversary episodes in a vision to widower Harold Bishop (Ian Smith).

The actress compared her comeback storyline to Dallas.

“I was dubious,” she admitted. “Because it seemed a bit like Patrick Duffy waking up in the shower. But once I had a meeting with Ian and the producers, they convinced me that it would be done with taste and integrity. And hopefully that’s how it will display itself.”

Dennis, 56, has played Neighbours villain Paul Robinson since the soap begin in 1985. The actor admitted when he first went to the UK back in the 1980s that he was shocked by how the British audience had taken Neighbours to their hearts.

He said: “We knew nothing. We knew that it had become popular over here, but we had absolutely no idea of the popularity and the fanatical popularity that it had achieved at the early, early stage.

The actress with Ian Smith and Tom Oliver, on the soap’s set circa 1985.

“So for want of a better expression we were lambs to the slaughter. We weren’t prepared for any of it. It was just this bombardment of fanatics. It took us by storm.”

Mark Little, 55, played loveable layabout Joe Mangel from 1988 to 1991 and returned for the 20th anniversary in 2005. The comedian revealed he was asked by producers to tone down Joe’s Australian-ness, but in the end that was what the British fans loved.

He said: “I only did three years, but it just seemed to stick in people’s memories and people’s hearts.

“It was weird. I hadn’t expected it. I tried to give him a bit of Australian lingo that was sort of dying out, and dragged it back into the language. Chooks and galahs and mongrels and all that.”

Fact box

• Erinsborough, the Australian suburb where it is set, is an anagram of Or Neighbours.

• Approximately 28,000 cast and crew have worked on the show in the three decades.

• Since Neighbours was first broadcast in 1985, the soap has been watched in more than 60 countries around the world.

• The Neighbours 30th anniversary show yesterday marked episode 7,083.

• It takes six months for an episode to be plotted, filmed and edited before it airs on screens.

• There have been 15 births, 34 deaths and 41 marriages so far.

• There are approximately 3,320 pieces of clothing in the costume department.