YOU can't miss him. He has one green jacket and one pink jacket and he's watched by millions of people every week.

Laurie Holloway has played with them all yet he's hardly a household name.

He's generally only spotted lurking in the corner of the screen on a Saturday night when as musical director of the Parkinson show he tickles the ivories for the great and the good.

Everyone from Judy Garland to Dame Edna Everage has enjoyed his musical attentions.

He admits that being a born accompanist means that taking centre stage can be a nerve-wracking experience.

Having worked with just about everyone who is anyone, Laurie is completely unfazed by celebrity - but ever so slightly frazzled by the thought of taking top billing himself, which is precisely what he'll be doing at the Concorde Club in Eastleigh this evening.

"I normally work as an accompanist. This time I'm fronting the band. I quite enjoy it but the week before can be stressful," he confesses.

"I'm used to being a back-room person and having a supportive role, so this is very different. I do get quite a buzz out of it, though."

Usually only glimpsed as the latest screen siren du jour totters down Parky's staircase, Laurie has been a TV fixture for long enough to be a familiar face in his own right - even if people are occasionally flummoxed as to his actual identity.

"I walk down the street and see people thinking: 'Where have I seen him before?' But I like that kind of anonymity.

"I don't know how Parkinson and Rolf Harris, my neighbours, cope with the recognition. Everywhere they go people must stare and talk.

"People do sometimes come up to me. Most of them know who I am, but the other day someone thought I was Ronnie Hazlehurst, so I had to put him straight."

Laurie - who holds his hands up to writing the infuriatingly catchy theme tune to Beadle's About - is incredibly blase about his associations with some of the biggest names in showbiz past and present.

"I've worked with most people. If you play the piano reasonably well, it's like standing at Piccadilly Circus - everybody comes along at some time or other.

"I spent every day for six weeks with Judy Garland, rehearsing for a concert at the London Palladium. We had a good time, but she wasn't very well. I regret not getting any photographs or autographs.

"Liza Minnelli was in the same concert. She was 16 or 17 at the time and very showbizzy. We've stayed in touch.

"I didn't get invited to the wedding, but I played at David Gest's 50th birthday party."

Despite having a wealth of showbiz friends and a mantlepiece that must be buckling under an Everest of party invitations, Laurie is happiest away from the bright lights.

"I do what I have to do and then go home as quickly as possible!"

With neighbours like Parkie and Rolf, who needs London anyway?

"Parkinson and I are very old friends. He asked me to do work on his first TV series in 1970, but I was on the road with Engelbert Humperdinck so I couldn't. I've worked on his show for six years now. I even found his house for him, which is just down the road from me.

"Rolf and I go back even further. I first worked with him in 1962 and we've done lots of stuff together over the years. I should go into property, I think, because I also found his house."

Laurie bashed out his first notes on the piano at the age of four. By the time he was 16 he was organist and choirmaster at his local church. A year later, he turned pro.

"There weren't many boys from lower middle-class families in Oldham who played piano," reflects Laurie, now 65.

"My first job after I left school was as an apprentice draftsman. I realised I was earning more playing the piano for £1 a night in ballrooms, so I went professional.

"My mother was very excited, but my father, a French polisher who also played the piano, wasn't convinced it was a good idea."

Laurie met his wife, the late jazz singer Marion Montgomery, while he was playing in Johnny Dankworth's band at a London jazz club called The Cool Elephant - but almost lost her to fellow pianist Dudley Moore.

"Marion was the guest singer one week. She'd just had a big hit in the States. The moment I saw her I knew she was the one for me," he remembers.

"I asked Marion on about the second night if I could walk her home, because she only lived around the corner, but Dudley had already asked her.

"Dudley drove her home in his Austin Healey Sprite with the hood down. Unfortunately it was raining and Marion had her fur coat on, so I don't think she was very impressed."

Laurie Holloway is at the Concorde Club, Eastleigh tonight (Feb 4). He will be joined by bassist Dave Olney and drummer Harold Fisher. Tickets from £10 on 023 8061 3989