In the late 1950s, Michael Parkinson moved from Manchester to London to take up a job as a feature writer with the Daily Express newspaper. His schoolteacher wife, Mary, was pregnant with their first child and they decided she would stay behind until the baby arrived. Shortly after he had set up in a room in Bayswater, Parkinson received a phone call from his father, a coal miner who lived near Barnsley in the South Yorkshire coalfield.

“Job’s done. Mary’s been moved,” Parkinson senior informed him. Moved where, the son inquired. “To our house,” came the reply. “Why?” Michael asked. “Because we live in Yorkshire,” his father told him. “I know that but why have you kidnapped my wife?”

“Look, I’ve already told you but you won’t listen. If the boy is born in Lancashire, it can’t play cricket for Yorkshire,” the father said as if talking to an imbecile. “I know that,” Michael retorted, “but have you thought about the chance it might be a girl?” “Don’t be bloody daft,” the father replied and put down the phone.

Parky – My Autobiography is full of stories like that. There is a semi-surreal colour to many of them, especially those involving Parkinson’s father or other figures from his youth. A month after the telephone call, Mary gave birth to a boy – and he didn’t played cricket for Yorkshire.

Parkinson spent two years on the Daily Express and his book is particularly good on Fleet Street, its characters and its arcane practices. On the Express, the print unions ran a system that was so blatantly corrupt it allowed their members to use names like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck to claim a second wage packet. However, the experience was invaluable for a young journalist.

Parkinson reported on the controversial Lady Chatterley trial; he accompanied Princess Grace on a trip to Ireland; he attended the world premiere of John Osborne’s play Luther, which had a young Salford actor called Albert Finney in the title role; and he covered legendary Labour health minister Aneurin Bevan’s funeral.

In a chapter called “Brendan Behan’s False Teeth”, he recalls that the Irish playwright was informed that his teeth were poisoning him and, if he didn’t have them replaced, he would die. The Express bought Behan a set of false teeth and sent Parkinson to Dublin to check on its investment. When he arrived, he found a dentureless Behan, who explained that he couldn’t wear the teeth but he had given them to a friend who sold linen handkerchiefs in O’Connell St. Parkinson eventually met the friend, who seemed to be delighted with the teeth – but he had to take them out whenever he wanted to speak.

When the BBC decided to do a “talk show” in 1971, they needed someone who could mix current affairs and light entertainment issues in the manner of the Dick Cavett Show in America. Parky’s experience on the Daily Express and a variety of other publications and television programmes – including one of the few prime-time movie shows, Cinema – made him an ideal choice as presenter.

Parkinson and his producer were given 11 programmes in the graveyard slot of summer broadcasting to show what they could do. They began with Terry Thomas as their main guest and continued with Orson Welles, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Peter Ustinov, President Kennedy’s press secretary Pierre Salinger, Spike Milligan and Shirley MacLaine.

At the time, the BBC employed a committee to decide which programmes should be kept for posterity and which should be scrapped. This committee, in its wisdom, decided that all 11 of those initial Parkinson shows were expendable.

The first series was a remarkable success and the stand-out guest was Orson Welles who, as Parkinson says, could talk about everything from Citizen Kane to the innate good manners of peasants in a remote part of Spain. Parkinson was 36 years old when he did his first chat show and he kept it going for the following 36 years.

The book follows the highs and lows, his fall-out with the BBC, his move to establish breakfast television with David Frost, his relationship with George Best, his time in Australia, a return via afternoon television and a Saturday night Parkinson show again on ITV. He cites Rod Hull and Emu, and his interview with Meg Ryan as his greatest disasters. Muhammad Ali – whom they hi-jacked when he was in England to visit a bottling plant in the Home Counties – was the star guest of the second series, according to Parkinson. In fact, he suggests that Ali was the most remarkable human being he ever met and he discusses, in some detail, the four shows they did over 10 years.

Parky is studded with funny stories but one of my favourites comes from a show called All Star Secrets, which Parkinson did when he was trying to regain his position in the TV firmament having returned from Australia. The incident again shows his giddy appreciation of north of England humour. His guest was the “blue” comic Bernard Manning and, after speaking to him, Parkinson invited questions from the audience. The first person up on her feet was a formidable-looking woman, who denounced Manning as a male chauvinist pig, a bully, a racist and a general disgrace to mankind.

At the end of her tirade she stood her ground, looking challengingly at Manning and inviting a response. Parkinson said he feared the worst. Instead, Manning looked admiringly at his attacker, taking in her ample figure, and said: “By gum, lass, but I’ll bet you’ve crushed some grass in your time.”