Sound the fanfare, hang out the bunting, bring on the dancing bears ... I want to celebrate the fact I have turned 40.

Of course, it would be easy to be a bit depressed. I've had to tell myself that I will now never play at Wimbledon, be a supermodel or marry Brad Pitt.

And my body is clearly fighting the forces of gravity until they lay me six feet under.

But instead of feeling wistful for my well-spent youth, I've decided to view the past four decades as just the run-up to the most amazing time ahead.

I can afford to be a little spiritual about this. After all, just a couple of months ago I was in the latter stages of heart failure and, forgive my melodrama, but I didn't know if I would get to see the big four-O.

That sort of thing makes you realise how precious your life is, even if you haven't achieved an OBE or been featured in the pages of Hello!

Last Saturday, to herald the amazing time ahead, I celebrated my birthday in style with many of my closest friends.

The original plan was to have a big party but that was several months ago before my health problems emerged.

It was only a couple of weeks ago that I felt well enough to start thinking about organising something.

The first idea was to go posh and eat somewhere expensive. But after estimating the cost to all of us of babysitters and taxis, not to mention hunting through wardrobes to find something decent to wear that still fitted and hadn't been ruined by baby sick, I decided to go for interesting instead.

I booked a table at The Laughing Onion in Kemp Town, which had been highly recommended to me. It sounded novel.

The proprietor, Jean-Jacques, is a former singer who'd achieved a certain fame in Paris during the Sixties and Seventies.

For the past 25 years he has run a small restaurant where he cooks the food and then emerges from his kitchen to sing to his customers. At £14.95 for three courses, he clearly isn't in the business for profit.

So 14 of us gathered. The Muscadet and Cotes du Rhone were flowing at our table and everyone seemed to be having a good time.

Several of my friends - Jake and Rafia, Hamish and Gina, Ian and Morag - had never met before and I was relieved to see that, with enough lubrication, they were all laughing at Jake's sperm joke (perhaps he'll tell it to you one day, too).

And then Jean-Jacques appeared. To the accompaniment of Henry, the pianist, JJ roared, "Je ne regrette rien ..."

He swung his arms around, almost spilling the wine from his glass. "Oooh ...ah em a leetel beet slowooshed," he slurred, apologetically.

He then scanned the room. "Where is Jacqui?" Reluctantly, I raised my hand.

I'm not one for being the centre of attention. But there was no danger of that happening with Jean-Jacques.

He kissed my fingers and broke into a serenade which soon became raucous as he got carried away again.

While an almighty storm raged outside, Jean-Jacques entertained us with his warmth and enthusiasm.

It wasn't a night of high art, gourmet food or sophistication but it was certainly an amazing start to my new decade.