STANDING at the bar of a posh London spot, I spied the most handsome man I’d ever set eyes on.
Tall, strong, stallion-like — wearing cream chinos which left little to the imagination and a gold signet ring that glinted in the light.
Jilly Cooper inspired The Sun’s Sexpert Georgie Culley’s wildest adventures — her racy novels taught her to chase charm, chaos and ‘fun, fun, fun’ both on and off the page[/caption]
“Champagne?”, he asked in a clipped, upper-crust accent, flashing an utterly irresistible smile.
Thanks to Jilly, I’d “met” this man before — in the pages of her racy novels.
He was the real-life version of her dashing character Rupert Campbell- Black: Ridiculously posh, deliciously arrogant and so smooth “he could slide up a hill”.
Like a scene from Rivals, we were in a champagne-fuelled tryst a few hours later — and he did not disappoint. With his polo background, stamina and impressive package, he was dynamite between the sheets.
The next morning, as we sipped coffee in his plush Putney pad, the doorbell rang.
At first, he ignored it — until the knocking got louder and a furious woman started shouting through the letterbox, demanding to know why he’d been ignoring her calls.
That should have been enough to scare off any self-respecting girl — but not me.
I was hopelessly addicted: To the sex, the drama and, of course, him.
After devouring Jilly’s bonkbusters in my teens, I spent years fantasising about meeting the real-life Rupert.
So when I moved to London in my early twenties — South West London, naturally (Putney, the playground of posh boys in chinos) — I encountered a fair few.
Naughty booty calls
And thanks to Jilly, who wrote about class and sex with such candour, I knew exactly how to handle them, both in and out of the bedroom.
These “Ruperts” were incredibly refined, charismatic and could charm you into bed — but they could also be cruel, with “lots of other women on the go”.
Still, I enjoyed the, er, ride, and the sex, which took me to “Olympian heights”.
Up until then, I’d never really met those sorts of men. I was a girl from a bog-standard Bristol comprehensive — a world away from the champagne set Jilly wrote about.
But she made me excited for them — and for the great sex I’d eventually have with one or two of them . . . okay several, but who’s counting?
At the time, I was carving out my career in journalism, working at a press agency, and on a very modest salary. I loved going out and meeting new people — and it wasn’t long before I met another “Rupert”, this time in the bar of a casino.
He smelt of Creed, cash, and chaos, and casually dropped into conversation that he’d just lost £50k playing poker.
Jilly also introduced me to the debauched world of high-society orgies and threesomes — a theme that runs throughout Riders and its follow-up Rivals.
“But you can help me drown my sorrows,” he said, with a twinkle in his eye. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
Moments later, I was whisked into Raffles — one of the most exclusive private members’ clubs on the King’s Road — frequented by the well-heeled and famous.
We partied in the VIP area, sinking champagne, before a steamy taxi ride back to his.
It reminded me of reading that infamous Rivals opening scene — Rupert and Beattie Johnson getting hot and heavy in the lift of the Concorde departure lounge at Heathrow (in the TV adaptation, it became a Mile High romp aboard the famous jet.)
Only this time, it was me, a black cab and a very flustered driver. Dating this man was wild.
Sure, he was a walking red flag — macho, a bit sexist and about as trustworthy as a politician.
But at the time, I wasn’t looking for marriage or kids. I wanted men who “shoot through the hips first and get in touch with their emotions later”.
The iconic author after being made a Dame[/caption]
Emily Atack paid her respects to the Rival’s writer[/caption]
There was kinky sex in his City office (he worked in finance, of course); surprise Agent Provocateur gifts that didn’t stay on for long; and naughty weekends in the countryside.
Basically, he was chaos in chinos — and I loved every minute of it.
Jilly also introduced me to the debauched world of high-society orgies and threesomes — a theme that runs throughout Riders and its follow-up, Rivals. Completely taboo when she first started writing, nowadays ethical non-monogamy is on the rise. I’ve even witnessed these orgies first-hand — rooms full of raucous, real-life Ruperts in action.
At one swanky soiree in a Berkshire mansion, I spotted a randy Rupe mounting three beauties at once.
Don’t ask me how — I couldn’t describe the position and do it justice — but let’s just say he, ahem, stayed up all night.
Growing up, to me Jilly always made sex sound like such fun, and I couldn’t wait to try it.
Even amid naughty booty calls, champagne-fuelled quickies, bondage and threesomes, her hilarious euphemisms — like “otters diving into summer streams” — would leave you laughing out loud. In the pre-internet era, most films, magazines and porn seemed laser-focused on male pleasure, leaving women’s desires as an afterthought.
Women owned sexuality
Sex education at school in the early Noughties wasn’t much better — condoms on bananas and stern warnings about not contracting an STD or getting pregnant.
Sex was painted as something dirty, never as something beautiful or empowering.
But when I discovered Jilly’s books in my teens, it was a total game-changer.
She also taught me that sex — and relationships — aren’t always easy. They can be messy, funny, chaotic, and downright awkward at times. But that’s where the magic happens.
While she always wrote about strong, macho men, her female characters were just as powerful — especially in the bedroom.
Jilly’s women weren’t shy or secondary. They owned their sexuality, making her novels a breath of fresh air in a world that often sidelined female pleasure.
Take feisty Cameron Cook in Rivals. She doesn’t hesitate to tell shocked TV exec Tony Baddingham that he failed to make her orgasm — after he catches her with her “hands in her bush” post-sex.
And then there’s ruthless journalist Beattie Johnson, the “first not-quite-lady of Fleet Street” — unapologetically promiscuous and Rupert’s irresistible lover.
Jilly put women and their pleasure centre stage, making sure every girl knew she could enjoy earth-shattering orgasms (and plenty of them).
It’s a message I’ve carried proudly into my career as The Sun’s resident Sexpert.
Jilly was my inspiration — and one of the reasons I am where I am today. She made adulthood look fun and left me excited about sex.
As she famously said, it should be “fun, fun, fun!”
Her leading men tapped into every girl’s fantasy of being swept off her feet by a dashing bloke who could romance her at every corner.
She also taught me that sex — and relationships — aren’t always easy.
They can be messy, funny, chaotic and downright awkward at times.
But that’s where the magic happens.
It’s in those imperfect moments that intimacy feels the most real and beautiful. It was a lesson that helped me view relationships — and, inevitably, heartbreak — with a lot more honesty and humour.
Okay, Jilly did set me up for a bit of a fall with her characters’ near- impossible standards — let’s face it, not every guy is going to be dashing and blessed downstairs like her leading men.
But her message was clear — life’s always better with bubbles in your glass and a bloke between your thighs . . . and I couldn’t agree more.
She met with Queen Camilla earlier this year[/caption]
The author of Rivals at a film screening[/caption]
