Hollyoaks actress Jessica Ellis hopes that her character's cancer storyline will deliver an important message to viewers of the soap.
Tegan Lomax believed she was pregnant after sleeping with Ziggy Roscoe, but her positive pregnancy test turned out to be due to cancer.
Jessica told Digital Spy: "I think people will have been surprised because originally it seemed she would be pregnant and this is an unexpected twist. I never knew myself that with some types of cancer, you can take a pregnancy test and it wrongly comes out positive, so I think that's a really important message that people need to know about.
The actress added: "It sounds weird but I was really happy when I found out that we'd be doing this storyline, because when I think back to soaps in general, I've never really seen a young girl going through a cancer story - it normally tends to be older people. I think it's great that the show is covering it."
Jessica's character, Tegan, had leukaemia as a child, and so to be told her cancer has returned is such a shock, she keeps it a secret from sister Leela.
Jessica explained: "I think because it was such a long time ago that Tegan had leukaemia and she's been in the clear for a long time, the diagnosis comes as such a shock to her. After the baby scare and the arguments with Leela about Ziggy, to hear about the illness just puts everything into perspective and she is just devastated because of the situation that she's in."
"She doesn't want people looking at her differently and feeling sorry for her, and she definitely doesn't want Leela to feel that she has to forgive her [for sleeping with Ziggy] just because she has cancer.
