As everyone knows, Mr Udagawa was an important Japanese businessman whom Paul Robinson was on a constant mission to impress in Neighbours, circa 1987.

The presence of Mr Udagawa set in motion a chain of events that saw Paul propose a marriage of convenience to Gail Lewis, in the hope that his Japanese friend would invest more money in the Robinson Corporation if he was a respectable married man instead of a wealthy playboy gadabout. This led to a series of 375 hilarious misunderstandings, one minor confrontation with Mrs Mangel and, eventually, Gail having triplets and running away with them, never to be seen again.

As if this was not enough, Mr Udagawa returned some five years and 1000 episodes later, in the thick of a plot in which Christina thought a suicidal Paul had been burned to death in a derelict country house.

With Mr Udagawa cast as some kind of comedy harbinger of doom, we were more than a little bit concerned when he appeared to us in a dream last Thursday night, but thought no more of it until yesterday, when we downloaded something called The Book Of Many Little Things from disappointment.com.

There, on page two of the book, was a note thanking Mr Udagawa. Our blood ran cold.

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We’re thinking of going into hiding, but fear Mr Udagawa will only track us down, shame us into marriage, then set us on fire. If he does, you’ll be the first to know.