A WOMAN who was abandoned in a North-East phone box when she was only two days old is hoping a television show can help her find her mother.

In July 1951, the child was discovered in Brinkburn Road, Darlington, and taken to the town's Greenbank Maternity Hospital, where she was given the name Jane Doe.

But five years ago she decided to start an ambitious search for the mother who abandoned her and is hoping an appearance on BBC2's Close Up North programme last night will help her find clues.

On the show, she was pictured for the first time, but only identified as Anne, her middle name.

Much of the filming was done at The Northern Echo's Darlington offices, where Anne was reunited with former school friend, the newspaper's librarian Christine Watson.

Other than that, the search has so far only turned up the man who discovered her in the street.

But last night, Anne, who now lives in Lancashire, said: "My greatest hope would be that my birth mother is out there and that she will see it and hopefully find it in her heart to come forward.

"It may well be that she is down the other end of the country or across the world and does not know what's going on.

"I also did it, hoping people will understand what it's like for somebody like me to find this out and have a better understanding of what it's like."

She added: "I don't know how the story began or how it will end, and that's what I want to know. It would be nice for me to have an end to it all and ask all those questions I want to ask."

On the possibility of her mother coming forward, she said: "It's not something she's going to be able to do lightly, she will probably have kept this secret for 50 years and possibly not talked to many people about it.