DR MIKE NEWMAN played by PETER BENSLEY

Dr Mike Newman was the fun loving doctor who also ran Bunny's Place, after the days of Jim Howard and Anne Marie Austin.

His love life was as complicated as any other doctor's. He dated Sherry Andrews and Emmy King, carried a torch for Tania Livingston, and got engaged to terminally ill Melanie Drew. His girlfriend Nurse Gloria Stapleton had a split personality and was responsible for a spate of mysterious attacks in the hospital. These culminated in Mike being stabbed with a scalpel and left for dead. Surprisingly, after a bit of therapy Gloria returned to the hospital, declared herself cured, got her job back and started dating Mike again. However, Mike was put in a difficult position when it transpired that in the meantime, Gloria's other personality had married Chris Butler. Chris wanted her back, and Mike and Gloria's relationship floundered. After a long and complicated plotline, during which Chris dated Sherry Andrews, before moving in with Gloria, none of the unfortunates in this love quadrangle ended up with each other.

Mike was given the position of Hospital Registrar, but the responsibility and workload were too much for him and affected his moods. His close friends Lance Wilkinson and Emmy King convinced him to join them rock climbing, to forget his worries. It certainly worked - he fell of the cliff into a river and emerged lost and with amnesia! Lance never gave up hope that Mike was still alive, while the rest of the hospital seemed willing to accept he had drowned. Calling himself Mark, he ended up at a farm house and befriended a young woman called Linda Wilson. When he discovered his true identity, Linda followed him back to the Albert. Unfortunately, once Mike remembered who he was, he forgot all about his time on the farm and who Linda was! By this time, Linda had fallen in love with Mike and was devastated.

Peter Bensley tried working in a banker and a garage before deciding to become an actor. He has appeared in a long list of TV shows, spanning four decades.

After The Young Doctors was axed, Peter joined many of his co-stars by going over to star in Prisoner. He later appeared in Neighbours, Police Rescue and Home and Away.

Peter has also worked on classic children's dramas such as Round The Twist II and The New Adventures of Black Beauty.

He set up a production company with Julia Peters (Gloria Stapleton) and until 2001 starred as Jeff Hawker in Water Rats.