Reading old interviews with Simon Reeve there is a generalised glossy version of the narrative arc to his life. In short: raised in a tough corner of West London; left local comp with zero qualifications; applied for job as post boy on Fleet Street; seized the opportunity and ended up carving out a media career as the television presenter familiar on our screens today.

Sitting opposite me in a Covent Garden private club of which neither of us are members – for his all his success travelling through more than 120 countries making multiple award-winning television series Reeve is disarmingly normal - he begins to fill in the gaps in his life story that until recently he has never publicly revealed.

“I feel I’m at a point where I have an opportunity to talk about my early life,” says the 46-year-old, who has a boyish mop of dark brown hair. “It’s been life-changing going through that process and owning and accepting my past.”