The other night I was booked for a birthday party. I’ve performed at plenty of these before, as a jobbing comedian and also as a children’s entertainer.

The memo informed me that it was a 40th birthday party and the audience would be 99 per cent gay. The alarm bells started ringing straight away, but, thinking of the money, I chose to ignore them.

So why the alarm bells? Gay audience? They’ll be a cut above the Jongleurs stag night meathead crowd surely?

But gay audiences, in my experience, are an absolute nightmare. I really don’t like them.

Before you start comparing me to Garry Bushell, I would like to point out that while not being exclusively homosexual, I have had and continue to have relationships with members of my own sex. This is not the place for me to justify my sexuality, having spent most of my life doing this. It’s always been to gay people interestingly enough. Rather in the way that a non-Mancunian Manchester United fan feels the need to go into a monologue of how they’ve been supporting the reds since they were doing backstroke in their dad’s testes whenever someone calls them a tourist or glory hunter. I can sympathise, despite being a Manchester City fan. Especially since I’m about to become a father. I’ve even lost ‘friends’ over it.

This is another particular resentment I have against many gay people. Heterosexual bigots are simply homophobic, homosexual ones are hetero and biphobic as well. Those readers who don’t understand this have to realise that sharing a common sexuality does not mean sharing a common bond. Indeed, the opposite is more likely to be true.

There are gay people who resent the fact that John Hurt, a heterosexual actor, has played the very gay Quentin Crisp twice, while overlooking the fact that Pam St Clement, a homosexual actress has been playing the heterosexual Pat Butcher or whatever her surname is nowadays in EastEnders for donkey’s years. The same people who condemn Oscar Wilde for pleading heterosexuality at his trial and not making a stand for gay rights, despite living in a world where there was no Gay Switchboard, Attitude magazine, Peter Tatchell or gay marriage.

Not all gay audiences fall into this category of course. I have performed at many gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender events, benefits and clubs and have had wonderful reactions from the audience. London’s Comedy Camp for example is an almost exclusively gay night and works beautifully.

Gay people are particularly thought of as being tasteful and the people to consult on the subject of fashion, interior design, indeed any form of aesthetics. When it comes to music, however, it all falls down. I like Shirley Bassey and Judy Garland, but I draw the line at boy-bands, Sinitta, X Factor rejects and the Euro-fucking-vision Song Contest. I’ve never met a non fag-hag heterosexual that liked it. And Dancing Queen makes me cringe every time I hear it. Yet you mention Led Zeppelin or Bob Marley to a gay audience and it’s fingers in the ears time.

It’s the same with comedy. More than an hour after I was scheduled to go on stage (as everyone arrived fashionably late), I found myself sandwiched between a drag queen and a cabaret group. As you can imagine, being nothing but a plain stand-up who isn’t even pretty anymore, it was hell.

Luckily I’d brought my guitar, and won the crowd back by singing No-one Loves A Fairy When She’s Forty. I’m not that age yet, but in the back of my mind there was a touch of Archie Rice, John Osbourne’s desperate fading vaudevillian, in my performance. I’ve had better nights. And I felt like I’d compromised myself, playing to the audience’s two dimensions.

Drag is an ancient form of entertainment. Shakespeare is recorded as having dragged up to play the original Lady Macbeth. Hardly Divine. Back in Manchester I knew the veteran female impersonator Diamond Lil, who was rumoured to have had a thing with Ronnie Kray back in the day. Personally I remember her being a bitter old queen who used to slag off Danny La Rue all the time. Most drag queens tend to be bitter. Men in drag aren’t funny unless they look like Osama Bin Laden or Phil Mitchell. Boy George isn’t far off these days. That’s why I find the Rocky Horror Show over-rated, as well as overdone. Drag queen are always ‘Woman as Monster’.

Cabaret can be marvellous and is also the name of one of my favourite films. Frisky and Mannish are outstanding. You wouldn’t, however, want them on the same bill as Stewart Lee or vice versa. Gay audiences at parties or indeed most places don’t listen to stand-up. Outside the comedy circuit I cannot think of a single gay friend that likes stand-up comedy, whether it’s Alan Carr, Paul Sinha, Larry Grayson, Scott Capurro or Duncan ‘Chase Me’ Norvelle – and that’s quite a range of styles.

They like Lily Savage though. But not Paul O'Grady. You can’t dance or clap along to plain stand-up nor can you chat (about yourself) whilst it’s happening. Gay audiences have the attention span of a 15-year-old delinquent with ADHD. If it isn’t wearing sequins or lycra, they ain’t gonna look, and if it’s vaguely cerebral, they ain’t gonna listen.

Ironically the gay scene and the comedy scene are very similar. All glittery and shiny on the outside, but when one scratches beneath the surface, it’s dull and dark. I’ve had good and bad experiences with both. Funny how the bad ones are always much more memorable. And I’m not even a proper poof.

• Danny Hurst will be performing in I Was A Teenage Rent Boy at the Royal Mile Tavern at 8.30pm during the Edinburgh Fringe in August.