Room for one more on the bandwagon? Lee ‘Nelsy’ Nelson is yet another comic chav, clad from baseball cap to white trainer in sportswear logos and cheap-and-chunky bling, fag behind the ear, can of Stella in hand.

But if you’re expecting some broad caricatured stereotype spouting buzzwords like ‘Asbo’ in the hope that recognition alone will generate a laugh, creator Simon Brodkin has a few welcome surprises in store.

For Nelsy is so much more than that; he’s a fully rounded character, played not with a sneer but with affectionate ribbing. So what if he isn’t the brightest, most responsible, most honest bloke you’ll meet? His cholesterol-clogged heart is, vaguely, in the right place.

The key to any lovable yob is having the gift of the gab, the charming banter that’ll get you into scrapes – and help talk you way out of them again. And it’s that spirit that Brodkin best captures, able to josh effortlessly and cheekily with the audience without ever once slipping out of character.

It’s a trait he shares with all the best character comics – and while, just over a year into his career, you couldn’t put him in the same league as the likes of Al Murray's Pub Landlord; you can see the potential to join him.

Nelsy’s material is, as you would expect, all about rougish council estate life, the drinking, the casual fights and the even more casual pregnancies. What makes it so impressive, and funny, though is that it’s all entirely credible – even when it’s equally obviously exaggerated.

Yes, there are a lot of comics covering this ground. But this is the definitive way to do it.

October 2005