TESS Daly posed a curious question in BBC1’s ballroom on Saturday night.

“Blend a top chef with a brilliant professional dancer, drizzle on gallons of fake tan, sprinkle with hundreds and thousands of sequins and finish with a Lycra dressing and what have you got?”

You’ve got a TV host on the brink of losing it, I think.

But you’ve certainly not got Gregg Wallace, who she was actually introducing.

Because, as he pointed out immediately afterwards: “Everybody who watches MasterChef assumes I’m a chef, but I’m not – I’m a greengrocer.”

Greengrocer, short-fused doughnut and now star attraction at Strictly Come Dancing XII which has got off to a flyer.

His cha-cha had all the grace of a drunken, leery dad at a wedding disco, handicapped with a 4ft wooden broom handle shoved down the back of his shirt and underpants.

There is much to celebrate on the happiness-packed antidote to X Factor’s dream-crushing misery...

Jennifer Gibney, from Mrs Brown’s Boys, either jiving on a coffee table or kicking off the excess water from stepping in a puddle.

Bruno Tonioli telling Bargain Hunt’s Tim Wonnacott: “Your technique is difficult to define.”

Caroline Flack, wearing the tattered remains of Robbie Williams’ Millennium video set, opening the series with a fun-oozing cha-cha.

Dave Arch, a musical genius who can turn Adele’s Someone Like You into a waltz, which it isn’t.

Scott Mills, a man whose limbs are unaware of each other’s existence, heroically side-stepping the hazards in a scene I’m calling Indiana Jones and the Booby-Trapped Cavern of Dog Muck, only to be told by Len Goodman: “It’s the sort of dance that would be better on the radio.”

The brilliant Darcey Bussell reassured him: “You attacked it.”

With a crowbar and a bottle of chloroform.

And I’m not sure what Scotland was expecting from David Cameron’s promises but I’m fairly sure it wasn’t Anton du Beke in a kilt giving Judy Murray the caber-toss treatment.

It’s especially encouraging given last year’s tough act to follow and floor managers straying in front of the panel giving their scores.

There’s also the unavoidable issue – two female hosts on a BBC flagship, which I have absolutely no problem with.

Just not on this show.

Strictly, you see, is a down-to-the-core celebration of male-female partnerships.

You’ll never convince me that pairing Tess Daly, who’s upholding Bruce Forsyth’s legacy by fluffing her lines and missing her marks, with Claudia Winkleman is anything other than a badly judged, mistimed BBC attempt to break new ground.

It would jar just as horribly with two men at the helm.

Either Graham Norton or Dara O’Briain would have been my choice as the replacement for Brucie who, incidentally, is not missed in the slightest.

Neither is James Jordan. Unlike him, the remaining professionals (and the judges too for that matter) truly get how this show ticks – they’re the catalyst to the entertainment, not the entertainment themselves.

But that’s Strictly’s strength. Its format is so unbreakable it can withstand two wrong hosts, an initially sorry-looking line-up, self-appointed class clown Bruno Tonioli performing mime tomfoolery, wandering floor managers and a cynical schedule clash engineered by The X Factor, which it roundly thumped.

No surprise either. As Craig Revel Horwood told Mark Wright: “I thought it was exuberant and a joyous experience.”

Keeeeeeeep it up, Strictly.

Spudulikes...

* Billy Connolly’s Who Do You Think You Are?

* BBC2’s brutal Peaky Blinders and its soundtrack.

* The Ryder Cup’s mesmerising final day’s singles.

* ITV admirably not seeing Cilla through rose-tinted specs.

* Mel B’s blunt rudeness lifting The X Factor’s Bootcamp... Ben Quinlan: “I really want this chance.” Mel: “No. Get off.”

* The Chase question: “Who did Adolf Hitler marry?” Contestant: “Hilda.”

* Prof Alice Roberts on Horizon: Is Your Brain Male Of Female?: “These gender stereotypes are potentially quite destructive.” Couldn’t agree more. Have you seen a woman trying to parallel park? Destructive alright.

Spuduhates...

* The X Factor losing its marbles with meddling producers and Louis Walsh making up rules as he went along at Bootcamp.

* EastEnder Shirley Carter’s Lee Harvey Oswald impression from the flat above The Vic.

* Esme’s diabolical Brummie accent on Peaky Blinders: “Oim nut a blud mimba of dis familoy but p’rrrraps Oy can see things in a defferent loyt.”

* Celebrity Squares stretching the definition of “celeb” with “heptathlete Louise Hazel” and “Snog Marry Avoid’s Ellie Taylor”.

* Good Morning Britain’s inability to spell “extemist”.

* The prospect of Peter Andre, Towie spinoffs, Celebrity Dinner Date with Joe Swash and endless reality TV claptrap on new channel ITVBe. ITVBegone.