After the last plate had been cleared away, he dropped the bombshell. “I’ve found her. I’ve found my birth mother.” It was just as well I wasn’t holding the crockery. I was so shocked, I’d have dropped the lot.

       Andrew Pierce has been my friend for 20 years. I knew he was adopted but he’d never, ever talked about it. I was aware he’d spent the first couple of years in a bleak children’s home, run by Roman Catholic nuns, but he never went into detail and I was too scared to raise it because you never know how deep the wounds go.

       And then this bolt from the blue. How did it happen? Why did it happen? He had decided to track down his Irish birth mother, Margaret Connolly, he explained, because life is short and he felt time might be running out.

       He wanted her to know he’d turned out OK. Well, more than OK. To me, it felt like there was part of him that wanted to show her that even though she’d not been able to keep him – for whatever reason – he’d made a huge success of his life. And who could blame him for wanting her to know that.

       He feared, and was probably right too, that she was still haunted by her decision to give him up for adoption when he was just two years old. Yes, he’s had a happy life with his beloved adopted mum and dad Betty and George Pierce.

       They already had three children who never for a second resented him, which is incredible in itself.

       I think I might have resented a two-year-old being plonked into the middle of the family nest and, for a while at least, taking all the attention. But they didn’t. They treated him like their brother.

       Andrew said he’d delayed searching for his birth mother for so long because he didn’t want to do anything to upset his adoptive mum, Betty, who he loved very much.

       But he told me: “Before my Dad slipped into the twilight world of Alzheimer’s, he used to take me aside and whisper, ‘You should find your birth mother. She used to visit you in the children’s home. Tell her you’re OK. There won’t be a day that she doesn’t think about you.’”

       So Pierce (we have always called each other by our surnames – God knows why, but we do) did just that. He never told Betty what he was doing because he thought it might break her heart. I remember the tears streaming down his face when he told me: “Mum might think that her love for me wasn’t strong enough. So I can’t tell her.”

       I suspect he might have been wrong. I’m sure Betty would have absolutely understood the need of an adopted child to know where he’s from. But Pierce was adamant.

       He wasn’t going to do anything that would risk upsetting the woman who had given him nothing but love all his life. Margaret might have been his birth mother but Betty was the only REAL Mum he’d ever known. And loved. But that didn’t stop him being excited about his first meeting with Margaret.

       Our mutual journalist friend, Amanda Platell, had knocked on Margaret’s door some 14 years ago – she was already 83, Pierce was 48 – and there was an initial denial, which wasn’t surprising as she had given up Andrew – or Patrick James Connolly as he was back then – 45 years earlier. He’d been so excited about making that first connection and we were all sworn to secrecy about it. Only a handful of friends were in the loop.

       But his initial excitement was soon to be mired in disappointments, hurt and rejection.

       When they finally did meet in the BHS café in Birmingham city centre (her choice not his), she inexplicably never asked him a single question about his life with the Pierce family. Not one single question. How could that be?

       She never even asked him what he did for a living. If she had, she’d have discovered he was a celebrated journalist known by people all over Britain – except the woman who gave birth to him. She didn’t even ask if he was married or a practicing Roman Catholic like her.

       She proudly told him she went to church every day, sometimes twice a day. She told him all about the man she married – who knew nothing about Andrew – and the children they had together. As far as Pierce was concerned, that first meeting had gone well – or as well as it could – and he was looking forward to the second.

       Only Margaret didn’t show for the second meeting, leaving him outside the BHS store for more than an hour. How could she not understand how much she was hurting this boy she had given birth to?

       But still Pierce persevered, despite realising he was her “terrible, shameful secret”.

       The third time he was due to meet her, we were in Birmingham together. It was the Tory Party conference. He was going off in the morning before David Cameron’s keynote speech to see her at BHS. Where else? But can you believe it? She did it again. What the hell was wrong with this woman?

       I was devastated for him. I was so angry that I offered to drive to her house to have it out with her. But he wouldn’t let me. I don’t think me or any of his friends realised just how much this was tearing him apart. But still, he was always making excuses for her, no matter how many times she rebuffed and rejected him.

       Because that’s what it felt like to his friends. She’d rejected him as a baby. And now, when she had the chance to make up for that, she did it again. What possible justification could she have for leaving her first-born son waiting in the cold for hours on end knowing (not caring?) what that might be doing to him?

       She didn’t even ring to say she wasn’t coming. Or to ring later to apologise, or to explain why.

       Because while she might have had her reasons – guilt, fear of her family finding out – her son at least deserved an explanation. But it never came.

       And the pain he’d been carrying in his heart for years became implanted there forever. If he’d believed finding Margaret would ease his heartache, he was wrong.

       But still Pierce needed to find out more (it’s what we journalists do) and he set off on a journey to fill in the gaps about his birth mother. To find out why he was in the children’s home for so long. Because Margaret didn’t become pregnant in her teens, like many other Irish girls of her time, she’d been a mature woman of 34. After his birth, she’d placed him in the Catholic orphanage in Cheltenham, telling the nuns she was getting married a few months later and would come back for him then.

       But even though she never did, she continued to visit Andrew at the orphanage and refused to release him for adoption until he was nearly three.

       So the big question – who was his birth father?

       His birth mother gave the nuns a name but they had no evidence she was telling the truth.

       Pierce found the alleged birth father’s family, with revealing results. He also discovered Margaret had got married to a man called Patrick Lennon when he was still in the orphanage.

       They had a son called Patrick.

       Was he named after Margaret’s husband or the son she gave away?

       The search for answers took him on a remarkable, emotional and often agonising journey.

       I’ve known Pierce for years and we’ve shared so many tears over Margaret because she was always there – gnawing at his heart, an unanswered question in his head.

       I know he has no regrets about finding Margaret, who died in February 2021 aged 94, 13 years after their first meeting in Birmingham. But his book isn’t just about Margaret, it’s also a heartfelt tribute to Betty and George, his beloved adoptive parents – the people who made him the fantastic human being he is today.

       During his journey, he also uncovered potential mistreatment at the orphanage, which reduced me to tears even though it happened 60 years ago. This book charts an extraordinary journey. It’s full of funny and surprising stories.

       But at its heart lies the inspirational story of my friend Pierce’s search for his birth mother and what happened when he finally found her. No, it wasn’t all good but at least it’s brought him a kind of peace – not the kind he dreamed about for all those years. It was no fairytale ending. But just as Margaret has now been laid to rest, at least Pierce can begin the journey of putting his heartache to rest.

       And together with his adoptive family, we, his friends, will all be there to help him – to show him he IS and always has been loved…

       Finding Margaret: Solving the Mystery of My Birth Mother, by Andrew Pierce (Biteback, ￡20) is out now. Visit expressbookshop.com or call Express Bookshop on 020 3176 3832. Free UK P&P on orders over ￡25. Visit andrewpierceofficial.com for more details