I got there a little before 1pm (I had planned to be a bit earlier but didn't manage it). The first people in the queue had been there since 10.30am!

You can never tell when the queue will start to form. One of the audience management people told us that the queue had started at 8.30am the day before for the Tom Daley diving show.

I was fairly near the front of the queue when I arrived so I was reasonably confident about getting in. However, although you aren't supposed to do this, there were lots of people who had gone and staked their place in the queue and then let their friends join them later on when they arrived so I ended up not quite as close to the front as I had been when I arrived.

Basically you wait in line until the audience management people are ready for you. Usually there is someone from the audience management company at the front of the queue to do things like let people out of the queue to use the toilets.

When I went it was really cold - if it is like that tomorrow make sure you wrap up warm and take gloves. You can't take food into the studio but there is nothing to stop you eating in the queue so I would recommend taking something to eat and drink. I could have killed for a thermos flask of coffee!

There are different types of tickets - normal ones, priority ones and VIP ones. When people go into the studio, the VIP's go in first, the priority people go in next and the rest fill whatever seats are left so the audience management people don't know how many seats will be available for the general public because they don't know whether all the VIPs will or won't turn up.

I don't think the VIPs join the main queue but I am sure that the priority people were there so don't be lulled into a false sense of security - even if you are at the front there might be people behind you who are actually ahead of you in the queue because they have priority tickets.

It is entirely up to the audience management people when they start moving the queue - they won't do it until they are ready. In my case this was around 3.30pm.

Where the front of the queue starts there is a community centre. When they are ready, the queue is led across the car park into the community centre. Just inside the entrance the audience management company will issue you with a numbered wristband.

Once you have your wristband, everyone waits inside the hall inside the community centre. There were quite a lot of seats in there but not enough for everyone. There is also a refreshment counter where you can buy tea, coffee, hot chocolate and snacks like biscuits and crisps.

When they are ready, the audience management company will call out wristband numbers to start moving people into the studio. Last week they called those with priority wristbands out first - this got me a bit worried as there seemed to be an awful lot of people who stood up and left at this point but thankfully I got to be in the next batch that they called out.

Once you have been called out you go back out into the car park and across to the studio gates. Here your wristband will be checked to make sure that your number has been called out - they will send you back if you try to cheat the system so don't bother trying.

Also, just because you might get a wristband doesn't mean that you will actually get in to the live show. They issue wristbands to everyone in the queue. I believe that if you don't get in you get given a priority ticket for the next show but I only have that on hearsay...thankfully I didn't get to find out for real!

Once you are through the studio gates you then get directed into the actual studio itself and there are production crew that tell you where to sit. I sat where I was told (I couldn't argue with the offer of a front row seat). A few people asked if they could go up higher. Such requests were generally accommodated.

Once you are in your seat the production process then takes over and there is an audience warm up person who entertains the audience in between breaks in filming and during the ad breaks.

Hope that helps. If you need to know anything else, please ask

Thanks, bloodynora - I hadn't even thought about doing something like that

Ohhh ... thanks! Great ideas. My husband surprised me with the tickets (to cheer me up - he knows me so well!) so I bet he just missed the chance to ask for special consideration!
I see there's a number to ring on the e-ticket, so I'll try that in the morning. Thanks!

Natalian, thanks a million for taking the time and effort to reply so fully about how it all works - that has helped loads.
You are a complete star

I'll let you know if we get in!

Thank you, my pleasure. Good luck for tomorrow. Hopefully you will get in and, if you do, I am sure you will enjoy it.

Congratulations on getting audience tickets; natalian, thank you for sharing your experience and JaneFinn, I hope all went well for you today.

Like karenh I have been trying to get tickets for several years. I have applied for 20th January but I haven't heard anything yet. I so thought I was going to be lucky this year as I applied as soon as I received my alert from SRO, unlike previous years when the email arrived during the night so I didn't apply until the following day.

I was wondering how quickly you both applied for your tickets as I must admit I thought they were allocated on a first come first served basis rather than through a ballot, but I can't find anything on the SRO website or on my email which confirms either way.

I think it is done by ballot rather than first come first served. I am not sure why I think that - probably because you give a 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice of show when you apply and also because they are still advertising - if it was first come first served I would have thought all tickets would have gone by now.

I had an email from the audience management company to tell me that booking was open and I applied pretty much straight away.

Oh, I forgot to say. Don't read anything into not having heard about 20th January yet. I didn't get sent my ticket until the wednesday before the show and I assume it is like that every week.

I applied just before the emails went out as it was up on SRO's page around an hr before.
Applied for dress run and first 2 live shows but got nothing, kinda glad I didnt get tonight as would have been too upset to be in studio to witness Michael going out (didnt even see the show tonight at all)

Have been several times before though.