June Muriel Brown, MBE is a British actress, best known for her role as the busy-body, chain-smoking gossip Dot Cotton (now Branning) in the long running British soap opera EastEnders and for making other high profile television appearances on shows such as Doctor Who, Coronation Street, Minder, The Bill and The Sweeney.June was born in Suffolk in 1927. She was the eldest of five children however her baby brother died of pneumonia in 1932 aged 15 days and her elder sister Marise died in 1934 aged eight from a meningitis-like illness. During the Second World War, she was evacuated to Pontyates, a small village in Wales. During the later years of the war she served in the Wrens (Royal Navy) and was classically- trained at the Old Vic Theatre School