A five-inch scar and a chunk missing from her upper left arm, not to mention two sets of surgery under local anaesthetic on her face - actress Catherine Rabett has paid a high price for her addiction to the sun.
"I've always preferred myself looking tanned - and still do," says Catherine, 53, who lives outside Swaffham, Norfolk, with her husband, 58-year-old Kit Hesketh Harvey, the composer and performer, and her two children, Gus, 27, a singer, and Rollo, 25, who works in the City.
Even today, after suffering two types of skin cancer - a malignant melanoma on her arm and a basal cell carcinoma on her nose - she confesses that she cannot wait to get into a bikini at the first sign of sunshine.
"There's no history of skin cancer in my family, but like many who grew up in the Sixties and Seventies," says the former Bond girl and ex-girlfriend of Prince Andrew, "I was always outside as a child, and can remember getting very burnt. Later, when I began modelling, we were expected to be brown and everyone used sunbeds."
Professor Charlotte Proby, chairman of the British Association of Dermatologists (BAD) skin cancer prevention committee, recently warned: "Rising skin cancer rates are a major health concern. Many people are aware of the dangers. However, this has yet to translate into a culture of sun protection and skin checking."
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) has revealed widespread ignorance about Sun Protection Factor (SPF) ratings, with just 8 per cent understanding that they refer to protection from UVB rays only (not UVA rays). Less than a third of those surveyed in the research published last week said they checked the UVA star rating when buying sunscreen.
While Catherine is not ignorant about SPF, she admits that when she noticed a white pinpoint-sized spot develop on the side of her nose, five years ago, she ignored it. "I assumed it was some kind of blocked pore, and asked beauticians to have a look when I went for facials." Eventually, she noticed another spot - quite black, on her upper left arm. Her GP referred her to a specialist, who said the spot on her nose would need testing, but would probably be a basal cell carcinoma (BCC), the most common type of skin cancer. About 75 per cent of non-melanoma skin cancers are this type, which develops mostly in areas exposed to the sun. It is most often diagnosed in middle or old age. BCCs can be itchy, may bleed if scratched, and can grow if not treated.
Catherine thought she ought to mention the black spot on her arm. "That we have to take off," the specialist told her. "That is quite serious." Within 24 hours, the spot had been biopsied. The results arrived promptly. It was a stage one malignant melanoma, the fifth most common cancer. About 13,300 Britons are diagnosed with melanoma each year, and skin cancer rates are more than five times higher than in the mid-Seventies, according to Cancer Research UK. These increases have seen hospital admissions for skin cancer in England rise by 41 per cent - from 87,685 in 2007 to 123,808 in 2011.
"I was shocked when the diagnosis was given, but I always assumed that it would all be OK," says Catherine. Swift treatment followed: the area was cut out, leaving a five-inch scar and a significant dent, and her lymph nodes were tested to see if the cancer had spread. "I was told I was lucky; that it was caught early, before any spread. There was no need for radiotherapy or chemotherapy; just vigilance in case it - or another spot - came back."
However, while a biopsy on Catherine's nose showed it was non-malignant, BCCs must be removed in case they grow. Standard therapy is by Mohs surgery, where the cancer is scraped away under local anaesthetic, and the edges tested for cancerous cells. Consultant dermatologist Dr Nisith Sheth of Cedars Dermatology Clinic in London says: "Mohs surgery, which costs about pounds 2,000, is a staged procedure which gives the highest cure rate and best cosmetic outcome. We inject local anaesthetic, then cut out a very small area around the cancer. We bandage up the wound and analyse the sample, looking at its edges. If there are any cancerous cells there, we go back and excise more tissue. This way, we don't make too big a hole, but can be confident we have removed all the cancer."
Catherine says: "It took an hour and a half between the excision and the results coming back. I had to go in for a second round of scraping. It wasn't painful, but it wasn't pleasant. You can feel the sensation and hear it.
"Had the cancer carried on growing I might have lost the front of my nose or my entire right nostril. As it is, you can hardly see where the hole was, or the subsequent repair." She plans to have some broken veins treated with laser, but says no one else is likely to notice any difference.
Now scrupulous about slapping on Factor 30, Catherine hopes others will learn from her story. "People still don't seem to realise how serious the danger can be - and I wish they did. I have been very lucky, but not everyone is."