About Jean Alexander
Jean Margaret Hodgkinson (11 October 1926 – 14 October 2016), known by the stage name Jean Alexander, was a British actress. She was best known to television viewers for her long running role of Hilda Ogden in the soap opera Coronation Street, a role she played from 1964 until 1987, and as Auntie Wainwright in the long-running sitcom Last of the Summer Wine from 1988 to 2010. For her role in Coronation Street, she won the 1985 Royal Television Society Award for Best Performance, and received a 1988 BAFTA TV Award nomination for Best Actress. == Early life == Jean Margaret Hodgkinson was born at 18 Rhiwlas Street in the Toxteth area of Liverpool, Lancashire on 11 October 1926, to Nell and Archie Hodgkinson; her father worked as an electrician and the family lived in a terraced house with no indoor lavatory. Alexander had an elder brother, Kenneth. She aspired to become an actress from an early age, and later said that she was inspired by variety acts she saw at the Pavilion theatre in her home city. She attended St Edmund's College for Girls in Princes Park, Toxteth and as a teenager, she joined an amateur theatre group and took elocution lessons. == Career == Alexander spent five years as a library assistant in Liverpool but, with a love of Shakespeare, decided to be become an actress, making her stage debut in 1949 at the Adelphi Guild Theatre in Macclesfield. She first appeared as Florrie in Sheppey by W. Somerset Maugham. She later would spend 12 years working in rep in Oldham, Stockport and York.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.