MARNIE Thomson will wear a very special good luck charm when she takes part in Cancer Research UK's first Scottish Pretty Muddy event in Glasgow.

A special pink rosette, decorated with a photo of her mum, High Road actress Lesley Fitz-Simons, is all the teenager says she needs to get her to the finish line.

Marnie said: "I'm doing this for mum. I still feel she's with me in a lot of ways, and I know she would have loved seeing me on the Pretty Muddy course.

"She was such fun and loved to laugh. This would have been right up her street."

It's been just over a year since Marnie, 18, lost her mum following a long battle with cancer.

Lesley, a favourite on the STV soap for more than 20 years until it was axed in 2003, was only 51 when she died at Glasgow's Royal Infirmary in January 2013.

After being successfully treated for cervical cancer in 2000 when she was 38, Lesley's prospects of a full recovery had looked good.

But in 2009, when she was 47, she had to break the news to her daughter that she had breast cancer.

Chemotherapy shrunk the tumour before Lesley had a mastectomy, followed by radiotherapy.

Treatment initially went well, but in October 2011, Lesley's health took a turn for the worse. Marnie was the only one at home with her mum when she had a frightening seizure.

She explained: "I had no idea what was wrong. We'd been sitting watching TV and I was thinking of going out to walk our collie but I'm so glad now that I didn't because mum would have been alone.

"She began to shake and it was really frightening. I rang for an ambulance and they came straight away."

A scan at Glasgow Royal Infirmary confirmed doctors' worst fears: the tumour had spread to Lesley's brain.

It was the beginning of a downward spiral that saw Marnie robbed of her mum and best friend.

Lesley continued to fight the disease for another year, the tumour taking its toll and eventually affecting her speech. In January 2013, the cancer had spread to her liver.

Lesley passed away in hospital on January 26, 2013.

Marnie, who lives in Milton of Campsie, is looking forward to taking part in Pretty Muddy at Bellahouston Park tomorrow.

Along with hundreds of other women, she'll run, climb and clamber over a series of obstacles on a 5K assault course. Marnie said: "Mum just loved to have fun. There wasn't a day we weren't doubled up laughing. I really miss that."

l To donate, see Marnie's Just Giving page at www.justgiving.com/muddy-pink-ladies274/. For Pretty Muddy and Cancer Research UK, see www.cancerresearchuk.org