Cocaine, escorts and handsy men – the shocking truth about what it was like waitressing at the summer season’s poshest events: ANNIE HAYES

Every year, as the summer season enters its busiest weeks, I am taken back to my days as a waitress in the most exclusive enclosures of Henley and Ascot.

This was the 1990s, when even fresh-faced young women like me, straight out of university, were required to handle drunk, often handsy, punters and smile sweetly for the tips.

The day’s wages were a pittance, but you often got much more from puce-faced ‘gentlemen’ who considered it acceptable to stuff notes down the front of your blouse.

Young Taggie from TV’s Rivals would have recognised it. Hospitality at the sharp end of the silver service platter was not for the faint-hearted.

We didn’t complain – the unspoken rule was ‘what went on tour stayed on tour’ – but there are grim moments etched into the memory.

Serving a rowdy table in the Stewards’ Enclosure at Henley meant endlessly topping up glasses as they offered flirty, Rupert Campbell-Black-esque raised eyebrows and the odd pinch.

I refilled one chap’s champers for what felt like the hundredth time before I noticed a fine line of white powder on his cheek, above his nose. His saucer-wide eyes were the giveaway.

While they partied like rock stars, we were the penniless students sleeping on a campsite between shifts. But we had the last laugh in ways the punters never suspected.

On sweltering days, when nobody was looking, we’d whip off our tights and hideous court shoes and cool our feet in the ice buckets. When the crowds returned for their refills, we’d smile and ask, ‘Would you like ice with that?’

Over at Ascot, my friend Milly and I were paired up to serve lunch in a private box – a room full of men, three courses, and me tasked with silver-serving the beef. It was a good job I’d known Milly since school because when she gave me the ‘look’, I knew it meant another one of them had had too much Veuve Clicquot and was getting frisky.

At least that meant they didn’t notice when I ran short of beef. I was always miscounting or giving in when a guest winked at me for another slice, meaning there was nothing left by the time I got to the last guests.

If they were drunk enough, they’d squint at their potatoes and cabbage and plough into it oblivious. They were paying top dollar but could have been eating school dinners.

Lobsters were easier. Everyone got one, though it could prove difficult to keep the crustacean balanced between two silver spoons and prevent it from landing on a dress. Mostly, the women were nice about it, despite the oily butter on expensive silk.

My friend Cathy had it worse. Serving quail, she managed to deliver one directly into a gentleman’s lap, gravy and all. He leapt up, the brown patch on his tan chinos already congealing, and demanded she be fired on the spot.

In a rare instance of the hospitality agency siding with us rather than them, she wasn’t.

Usually, they were strict beyond all reason.

When another friend complained of a stomach ache and begged to go home, they told her to take an Anadin and finish her shift. At the end of it, she limped to A&E where it was discovered she had acute appendicitis.

We muttered mutinously, but some behaviour was even more outrageous. When a group of bankers invited a bevy of escorts to share their Ascot box one afternoon, the waitresses were slipped £50 to disappear for a few hours.

Once, I was caught in a rain shower on my way to Henley and, poof, my curly hair became a flyaway bird’s nest. I tried to tie it back, but fear the black forest gateaux may have come garlanded with extra decoration that day.

None of it was deliberate – unless a male guest patted your behind as you left the box or failed to tip.

I’m returning to Henley in July, this time as a paying customer. I’ll ooze charm to the waiting staff and try not to slur my words as they top up my fizz. Good manners cost nothing, after all. And if bad ones still come at a risk of finding a fly in your soup, I’m siding with the staff.