Carol Patricia Smillie (born 23 December 1961) is a Scottish former television presenter, actress and model.

[2] In 2012 Smillie decided to leave mainstream TV and created a new business venture, launching a brand of leak-proof underwear for women, named DiaryDoll.

[7] At age 18, in 1979, Smillie embarked on her first year at the Glasgow School of Art, studying Art, Design, and Fashion, with the idea of becoming a fashion designer, but felt she didn't really fit in with the typical punk students sporting green hair and pink shoes.

[8] Smillie's presenting career launched in 1989, at age 27, when she beat 5,000 other applicants[9] to become the hostess and puzzle board operator of Scottish Television's Wheel of Fortune game show.

[10] Smillie joined the show as co-presenter with Mickey Hutton, alongside the main presenter Esther Rantzen.

The show recognised unsung heroes and heroines who had shown outstanding bravery and dedication to public life.

Smillie was back working for STV Productions in 2005 as presenter of the short-lived ITV show The People's Court.

Len Goodman often referred to her as the Dark Horse of the competition, and played music from the Black Beauty TV series over her training clips on the complementary show Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two.

[15] In 1993, she appeared on the Saturday evening BBC One light entertainment show Noel's House Party, when her "Gotcha" tape was shown to viewers.

In the summer of 2009, Smillie appeared as a guest presenter of STV's The Hour for one week, with main anchor Stephen Jardine.

Using silicon prosthetic makeup, she was transformed from female to male and was then given the challenge of attending a speed dating event as her new opposite sex self.

[citation needed] In June 2009, Smillie appeared in the BBC Radio Scotland comedy sketch show Ellis and Clarke.

Smillie appeared in a number of sketches in the 30-minute production playing herself, in which she and the members of the cast parodied her television personality.

It considered work-life balance, time management, workplace rights to maternity leave and pay, tax credits.

[20] Starting on 10 May 2008, Smillie co-wrote – with animal behaviourist Emma Magson – a weekly column in The Times entitled 'Perfect Pets'.

[21] In February to March 2010, Smillie appeared on stage in Hormonal Housewives, a new comedy written by Julie Coombe and John MacIsaac.

Smillie takes the part of Madonna, dancing and miming to the track "Holiday", dressed in a pastiche outfit based on the Jean Paul Gaultier-designed conical bra corset, from the singer's 1990 Blond Ambition tour.

Smillie took the play on a three-week tour of Scotland performing at theatres in Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Inverness.

The story concerns a man who is so desperate to get on Reality TV that he will try anything, including ultimately, holding up a shop at gunpoint to make the local news.

Together they created a range of women's underwear specifically for use during periods, with a secret waterproof panel inside them to remove the possibility of leaks and stains on clothing and bedding.

They were designed to look and feel like normal underwear – i.e. breathable, washable and not crackly – giving women the confidence to go about their usual activities.

[26] Smillie's smile was caricatured by the British impressionist Ronni Ancona in the UK television show Big Impression.

[30] When Smillie was hosting Wheel of Fortune in the early 1990s, she was invited to take the Mensa test for high IQs by a tabloid newspaper, to prove that game show hostesses were not stupid.

She said, "I felt slightly guilty at the time, but it hadn't really bothered me that I had cheated because it was never a real test to me, and Mensa had never invited me to take part.