When retired engineer Ralph Dixon picked up a note that had been pushed through his letterbox asking if he was interested in his home being used in a television drama, he was rightly suspicious. ‘The message and a telephone number were written in pencil and on a page ripped from a reporter’s notebook. I thought it was a wind-up,’ recalls the 71-year-old. Not surprisingly, Ralph and his wife Marilyn, 68, a retired NHS nurse, carried out thorough background checks before agreeing to allow their Grade II listed property, Oakleigh House, in the Norfolk market town of Swaffham, to feature in the ITV drama Kingdom.