'I have to kiss my old college pal on Red Rock' - Sarah Jane Seymour

The Meath native will make her debut on the soap tonight as Siobhan Reilly, a new love interest for Michael Hennessey, played by her college friend Jack Nolan.

"It's my first foray into soaps and it's my dream job," she told the Diary.

"I hadn't seen Jack in a while, but we would have been fairly close in college - so I was worried the kissing scenes were going to be awkward.

"But we have really good banter so it was fine - plus he's handsome, which doesn't hurt."

While she's the new flirty character on Red Rock, many will know Sarah Jane as the girl from the new Barry's Tea advert.

"People recognise me in really weird places - like restaurant bathrooms or if I'm on a night out - and will ask me if I'm the girl from the ad," she said.

"The weirdest one was when I was doing some promo for Radio Nova and I was parking the Jeep up and this woman was roaring at me through the windows about my parking spot, but then all of a sudden she stopped and started talking to me about the ad.

"Off she went and she totally forgot she had been ranting at me, so that was a good one because it got me out of trouble."

The ad is a bit of a family affair Sarah Jane's grand aunt Eileen and some of her pals star in it with her.

The 23-year-old was based in London, but is such a homebird that she moved home after a year.

"I was so homesick that if I got a job that would just pay my air fare I'd take it," she said.

"But there's something very exotic about people when they move away, and since I've been back I've been really busy, so it was the best decision I ever made."

Meanwhile, Sarah Jane is set to star in her first feature film.

"I'm shooting a horror film called Crone Wood with director Mark Sheridan. We're starting that next month," she said.

"It's a cross between The Wicker Man and the Blair Witch Project. Another college friend of mine, Elva Trill, is going to be in it as well.

"It's great to be working professionally with people that I studied alongside and grew up with."

Red Rock airs every Wednesday and Thursday at 8.30pm on TV3.