[4] She was educated at the Parliament Hill School for Girls in London and went then to the New College of Speech and Drama, where she received a diploma in dramatic art in 1975, and a teaching certificate one year later.

Her most prominent role was as next-door neighbour Janey in children's sitcom Metal Mickey, which ran from 1980 to 1983.

Young became Project director of the Archives and Museum of Black Heritage in 1997, she was Commissioner in the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts in the years 2000 and 2001, and Chair at Nitro Theatre Company in 2004–10.

[8] Young's other public appointments have included English Heritage's Blue Plaques Committee, membership of the board of the Royal National Theatre, the Southbank Centre, and the board of Governors of Middlesex University, chairing the Arts Council's Cultural Diversity Panel, and membership of the board of Resource, the Council of Museums, Archives and Libraries, and a commissioner on the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts.

[15] In 2020, she became Chancellor of the University of Nottingham, succeeding the former chief executive of GlaxoSmithKline, Sir Andrew Witty.