From the Daily Mirror, December 17, 1983:Sad Elsie makes her exit
Near to tears, actress Pat Phoenix leaves a TV location after recording one of her last scenes as Elsie Tanner of Coronation Street.
Pat, who is quitting the series after twenty-three years, would not say a word as she walked away from the Manchester pub where the scene was shot.
She stretched out face-down on the seat of the mini-bus that whisked her to the Granada TV studios 300 yards away.
Elsie is invited to leave the Street by old flame Bill Gregory, played by Jack Watson.
Bill, who gave Elsie her first kiss in the series, returns to give her the last one and provide the cue for her exit lines.
He asks her to join him in a new life abroad.
Jack said later that the scene had been "quite emotional" for both of them.
Elsie's final street appearance will be screened on January 4.
Of course, Pat Phoenix had not been in Coronation Street for twenty-three years, as the article stated. She left the show in 1973 and returned in 1976.
The 1983 pub location used for the scene with Elsie Tanner and Bill Gregory was the Pineapple, in Water Street, just up the road from the Granada Television studios.
The Pineapple was also the location for The Street's first birthday celebration in December 1961.
The pub later closed down and was bought by Granada Television.
In 1986, it was used for pyrotechnic scenes during filming of the burning of the Rovers Return story-line.
Some time afterwards, it was demolished and the site became part of the Granada Studios TV Tour car park.
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