No 1,912 Laura Croft

Laura Croft
Goodness, Angelina Jolie is having a bad day. It's not Angelina Jolie.

No? No. This is Laura Croft, the inspiration behind Lara Croft - the handspringing, gun-wielding, tight- T-shirted heroine of the Tomb Raider computer games, and now Tomb Raider: The Movie.

So she's not the British archaeologist fighting a secret cult that wants to control the world? No. But I see where you went awry. She's a chartered accountant from Wandsworth, south London.

And how is she the "inspiration"? Laura works for Coopers & Lybrand, the firm that helped the games company Eidos to find the moolah for Tomb Raider. She turned up at a marketing meeting one day and was introduced to the Eidos team, who said...

...we're gonna make you a star? Pretty much. Eidos wanted to capture the Hispanic market and had been thinking of calling her Louise Cruz.

Or perhaps Loise Crz? Probably.

So what happened to u? Me? Nothing. I wasn't even at the marketing meeting.

I mean how did we get from Laura to Lara? Well Lara's more exotic. Like Club Tropicana and Ricky Martin.

And how has this affected our chartered accountant friend? Oh, people comment on it a lot. In fact, every time she uses her credit card. They're amazed.

Happens to me all the time. Pardon?

I mean people can hardly believe I'm called Aluan Titchmarsh. Really?

Oh yes. They go barmy, asking for my autograph. I've even taken to hanging around garden centres and buying little items on my credit card to soak up the celebrity. Seriously?

Yes. Actually, I am the inspiration for Alan Titchmarsh. Right.

So does Laura actually bear any resemblance to Lara? She likes fast cars, apparently.