Andrew was born Andrew Dugald Daddo on February 18, 1967.

For the whole of his childhood he wondered what he’d done to his parents to give him a middle name like Dugald.  Then he thought about his twin brothers’ middle name – Beilby – and realised all he’d done was be born a twin and they would be both have to live with weird middle names as a kind of funishment.  Yes, that’s funishment, a fun punishment!

It was only later the two boys discovered that Dugald and Beilby were both special family names and since then Andrew and Jamie have stopped pretending they didn’t have middle names at all.

For Andrew, school was normal.  There were broken arms and fingers, scrapes and scratches, girlfriends, hot chips and a football team that refused to win a premiership.  There was even a fight.  Just one – in grade six.  And it was enough for him to realise that fighting would not be his thing because unless you were really good at it, you got hurt.

There was no gap between finishing school at Melbourne Grammar to starting university at Monash for an Arts degree.  In fact, a lot of Andrew’s friends noticed the first year was spent windsurfing on Port Philip Bay so, really, it kind of was like taking a year off.

During the second year things got a bit busier.  Andrew took a job with Network Ten as the host of a kids afternoon TV show.  It was cool.  The following year,  1987, Andrew moved to the ABC to host its live national music show The Factory.  There were lots of black t-shirts and tight jeans and enough time to finish his Arts degree with major in Politics and History.  The Factory lasted for two years, then Andrew was lured to New York to be the first Australian VJ on American MTV.  It  involved all sorts of shirts and stretchy jeans and saying “awesome” a lot.  

After MTV Andrew decided to leave the music industry behind and become an actor.  It was more out of necessity than anything else, and in 1992 he scored the Plum role in the TV production of Cluedo.  It was two seasons of slicked back hair and purple clothes and he’s kind of glad no one seems to remember it.


There was a stint on Round the Twist playing a Ghost and a couple of movies that he’s really glad everyone’s forgotten and the penny dropped like a slab of concrete that acting might not be his thing.

Maybe it would be writing books.  Hmmm.  He’d need a story first, and given he didn’t have one to tell, Andrew joined the Seven Network in 1995 as an all round network dogs body.  His first program was as co-host of The World’s Greatest Commercials with Cane the Dog.  

It was the first of a long list of programs with the network over a fifteen year period that included the long running news program 11AM, two Olympics, Funniest People (not that funny), Kidspeak, professional traveling on The Great Outdoors and various specials.  

It was whilst presenting 11AM that the writing bug got into Andrew’s system.


It started badly with an unpublished book called The Big Green Smiling Wobbly.  It was not a memoir if that’s what you’re wondering.

Happily for Andrew, the blow of his first rejected ‘manuscript’ was not enough to make him stop.  His second effort was eventually accepted and about a year and half after he started it, Sprung! was released.  A book of stories about a boy called Fergus who could easily have been Andrew at the age of ten but no one is admitting to that.

Andrew is now described, amongst other things, as an ‘accomplished author.’  He has written books for all ages – picture books, chapter books, short story collections, young adult novels and adult non-fiction.  

Since the beginning of 2008, Andrew has been part of the team at ABC radio, hosting the Evening Program for 702 in Sydney and NSW as well as 666 for Canberra and the ACT.  

He’s also very excited about some new stories he’s written and the next chapter in his own life that looks set to unfold.

Andrew lives on Sydney’s Northern Beaches with his wife Jacquie, three children – Felix, Anouk and Jasper and their dog Flog who continues to surprise everyone by waking up in the mornings.