Actress Hannah Waterman, who was best-known for playing Laura Beale on EastEnders, has a new life on the other side of the world after she left Walford for good and relocated to Australia. On the soap, Laura was businessman Ian Beale’s third wife, who met her sticky end after tripping over a toy and falling down the stairs in 2004 at the hands of villain Janine Butcher.
Hannah made her soap debut back in 2000 when when her character was introduced as hired nanny to Ian’s three children - Peter, Lucy and Steven. It wasn't long until the couple, who appeared head over heels, exchanged vows in 2001.
However, their tumultuous relationship was rocked when Laura discovered Ian had been sleeping with Janine Butcher behind her back. The pair had a heated showdown the night before Laura fell to her death, with Pat Butcher discovering Laura’s body at the bottom of the stairs.
However, Pat was still furious after discovering Janine’s involvement in Barry’s death, and even though she knew Laura’s death was an accident, she refused to provide her step-daughter with an alibi.
After leaving the soap in 2004, Hannah went on to star in other TV shows including the BBC One daytime soap Doctors, ITV drama series The Bill, as well as in her dad Dennis Waterman’s hit show New Tricks.
Hannah was previously married to EastEnders co-star Ricky Groves, who played unlucky-in-love mechanic Gary Hobbs, but the couple split in 2010 after she revealed she had reportedly been unfaithful.
The actress then began dating The Bill star Huw Higginson, and the couple are now parents to son Jack. Hannah and Huw made the decision to relocate to Australia in 2014, and she’s been working as stage actress ever since.
She spoke about her family’s change of scenery in an interview two years after the big move, and confessed it was a tough decision to make as she was having big success with a recurring role on Doctors. She said: “Work had really started to pick up but we thought ‘well, if we delay it again we just won’t do it’, so we thought we’d give it a year,” she told The Daily Telegraph Australia, before admitting a year ‘wasn’t long enough’.
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