THIS was a show within a show. Make that two shows within a show.

BBC Radio Four was in town on Thursday to record back-to-back episodes for the 64th series of I'm Sorry A Clue, "the antidote to panel games". Should you have missed Thursday's double bonanza, the first will be broadcast on December 14, the second a week later.

In a nutshell, this was I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue live and uncut: a chance to watch the long-running Beeb favourite in the making, with producer John Naismith as master of ceremonies, urging audience applause at the beginning and end and asking lugubrious, occasionally profane chairman Jack Dee to re-do assorted lines at the end of each recording session.

Likewise, when a technical glitch beset Leeds writer and comic Barry Cryer, the pause for repairs allowed him to tell a couple of bonus gags for the full house, who had snapped up the £8 tickets so eagerly.

Seeing how a radio show is made is not like a magician revealing the sleight of hand behind a trick and rather ruining it in the process. Instead, you fill with admiration at the wit and on-the-spot playfulness of Tim Brooke-Taylor and Sandi Toksvig in one team, Graeme Garden and Barry Cryer in the other, staying so sharp for more than two hours.

All the usual favourites were there: singing one song to the tune of another; myriad word games; double entendres about score-keeper Samantha; Jack Dee's doleful cynicism, in this instance at Yorkshire's expense. And you didn't have to be there to enjoy it: tune in next month.