ACTOR Tony Roper has enjoyed an almost 50-year career creating laughs on stage and on television in the likes of Rab C.

Nesbitt.

But even Jamesie Cotter would be taken aback at the discovery Tony almost murdered his own brother.

The story, set alongside a stream of tales, is told in Tony's new autobiography, I'll No Tell You Again.

Now 73, Tony reveals how, when growing up in Anderston, he almost killed his older brother, Pat.

He said: "One day, when Pat was really annoying me, my temper kicked in and I ran into the kitchen and grabbed a breadknife.

"I then ran back into the garden and whacked him with it."

The seven-year-old Tony aimed for the centre of his brother's back, but instead connected with a gap nearer his shoulder.

"I was lucky," Tony recalls. "I was saved from having a criminal record and a life- long reputation as a man who killed his brother."

l See Monday's Evening Times for a feature-length account of Tony Roper's autobiography, published by Black and White, £14.99.