IN her unmistakeably broad Glaswegian accent, Leah MacRae says, "I didn't always speak like this, you know.

"I used to live in a little village near Cambridge with a duck pond and I had a soft Scottish accent. Then I arrived at Victoria Primary in Govanhill and taught myself to speak a certain way because the kids at school were so horrible."

The comedy queen who has worked with Karen Dunbar and made her name on television screens as airhead Julie in Gary Tank Commander is describing her formative early years. Born in Belfast, her father was in the military and the family moved 13 times before she finished primary school, living in places as wide and varied as Berlin and Cambridgeshire.

She was completely unprepared for settling down in Glasgow.

"That was a shock and a half, it was horrible," she says. "The kids were so mean to anyone who was different in any way. That's why you get a job in comedy."

As she matures as an actress, the 31-year-old who studied drama at Glasgow's Langside College and is currently appearing in panto at the Pavilion, is seeing her career take a more serious turn.

Leah is the newest member of the cast of BBC Scotland's River City, appearing on screen on Tuesday as newcomer Ellie.

She is the new carer of Malcolm, played by Johnny Beattie, and has an intriguingly colourful past. It turns out Ellie has just left the world of professional wrestling and is trying to start a new life after splitting with her boyfriend Buster.

The smooth talking wrestler turns up in Shieldinch to open the mini market and quickly tries to win Ellie back.

"It's not ideal when you start a new job, you are nervous and your idiot ex turns up," says Leah, quite exasperated at the thought of how Ellie must feel.

"It's totally unexpected. She has a slightly shaky start but she does really well, without giving too much away."

Ellie was a ring girl who not only assisted Buster in front of the audience but booked his gigs, washed his clothes and made his dinner. She has had enough.

"He is adorable but is so frustrating. He doesn't listen to her," explains Leah." One of Ellie's first episodes is about what she wants and what he can't give her; there are some poignant moments."

So Ellie has gone back to her original career as a carer and arrives at Johnny's with some new ideas. Though there are some misgivings among the family at first, it doesn't take long for her to win everyone over.

Ellie might be in an unhappy place emotionally when she arrives in Shieldinch but there is no denying that she is very good at her job.

With experience working as a support worker, Leah, who is an ambassador for charity the Butterfly Trust for people living with cystic fibrosis, can tap into that when the camera start to roll.

"In one scene I shot with Johnny I felt really emotional and the director said, 'If you feel that just go with it.' I said, 'I can't because if I was at work I know I wouldn't get to the point where I would cry,'" says Leah.

" I would certainly be empathetic and really caring but I thought it was quite important not to. Support workers and carers work so hard and it is important to give them their due. I've done it, it's a really hard job though it is really rewarding."

Playing for laughs was what Leah wanted to do when she first graduated and says she couldn't believe her luck to get work with the BBC Comedy Unit.

As a teenager she was appearing alongside Karen Dunbar and legendary theatre actress Gabriel Quigley.

"It was an amazing experience working with Karen," she remembers. " I had worshipped her and she was so gracious to me, taught me a lot and looked after me, as did Gabe."

Leah went on to appear in front of sell-out crowds in the extended run of one-woman show 51 Shades of Maggie at theatres across Scotland but Leah says she was a bag of nerves before it started.

Rehearsals were in Belfast and when she arrived in Glasgow to start found herself on billboards all over the city.

"It was the fastest-selling show at the Pavilion since Mrs Brown's Boys," she marvels, "and they kept telling me this every morning. I developed a wee twitch in my eye. The director used to laugh at me.

"Every day they were coming in and saying, '700 tickets sold today.' Then they would come in the next day and say, '800 tickets sold today.' It was immense.

"I was absolutely terrified and just kept thinking, what if I go out and I'm rubbish? What if I can't do it, If I go totally blank? It's a two-hour monologue with no scene changes.

"When I went out on stage the first night, the lights came up, I was on the bed and the audience just erupted and that was it. I thought, 'If they are clapping now ...' and I knew what was coming so they would love it."

The show toured for two years, did two Scottish tours and played at the Pavilion three times. It led to Leah's role in River City when she invited its producers to come and see her on stage.

Now she is filming at the Dumbarton set alongside many of her friends, including Sally Howitt, who plays Scarlett.

"Over the past few years when I have been watching River City I have been thinking, 'This is really good,'" says Leah. "The actors are incredible and the storylines are great.

"Everything is fresh and there are some really good true and gritty lines that people are all affected by."

River City, BBC One Scotland, January 6, 8pm