While Byker Grove spawned some incredible careers, for one cast member it was the the job which would eventually end their time in the industry altogether.
Lyndyann Barrass was one of the originals, enjoying four years playing bolshy youngster Spuggy.
Unmistakeable with her flame red hair, the young girl with a big attitude was watched my millions of kids every week.
But it was her role on the hit after-school show which quickly ended her time as an actress a few years later. Little did she know it when she left the Grove, but Spuggy would actually put her in serious danger.
Aged 24, she was still on the hunt for opportunity and even had a go at music as it became difficult to get back on TV.
Joining a band, she soon decided that acting was still where he heart was - but that all changed after a night out.
"I appeared in a few one-off dramas, but I’d been typecast as the redhead from ‘that Geordie show’ and struggled to find work," she told The Sun.
"Aged 21, I joined a band called Angel, but we weren’t successful and I left after a year.
"Three years later, I was beaten unconscious in the street by three strangers who recognised me as Spuggy."
It would be the tipping point, and she took her career in a different direction.
"Thankfully, I wasn’t badly injured, but it was the final straw," she added. "I decided to quit show business for good."
In 1999, the Sunderland-based star married husband Allan and had two kids with him before their split in 2012.
She told the Mirror in 2014: "I'm a newly single parent with kids. I work in a bank call centre four mornings a week when the kids are in school."
She says Ant and Dec's daily income was two years' wages for her - but joked that she still has to buy the drinks when she sees them.
"I probably earn just over half of their daily salary for a year,” she said a few years later.
"I saw them last June when we did a surprise for them on the One Show. They owe me a drink. The last time I saw them, I bought them one!"
But she can still be found on TV if you look hard enough.
Lyndyann was one of the contestants on a Child Stars special of the BBC quiz show Pointless Celebrities back in February.
Alongside Chitty Chitty Bang Bang actor Adrian Hall, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory's Julie Dawn and Outnumbered star Tyger Drew-Honey, it rolled back the years.
She was paired with David Peachy who played Bernard in Bernard's Watch and now works as a GP.
Revealing why she was called Spuggy, which in Geordie dialect means sparrow, Lyndyann said: "I was only tiny; I was only 4"6 when I started doing it."
Maybe a comeback is on the cards?
She still lists herself as an actress as well as a businesswoman on Twitter and Instagram.
