Linda Herrick: Coro's version of Sex and the City is a yawn

So Todd Grimshaw has finally succumbed to the slimy charms of nurse Karl at the Manchester gay village party and the two lads got to stick their tongues down each other's throats. Big deal.

Coro's gay storyline, far from being daring or shocking, is a yawn. It has been telegraphed for far too long, with smouldering looks building between weasle-faced Karl and prize sap Todd, alleged possessor of a towering intellect which could have taken him to Oxbridge.

Studying what? The art of making toast? Todd is exceptionally dull. He doesn't do anything except work, drink pints (a new habit, thanks to Karl's urging) and cling on to the dying dream of domestic nirvana with pregnant Sarah Platt.

What does she see in him, anyway? Obviously, he can't be that overwhelming in bed. Just kids, they don't converse much and she must be sick to death — as are we — of his self-deluding mantra: "Just you, me, Bethany — and the bebby".

Now he'll have to add Karl to the list, as the pathetic plot rolls out over the coming weeks. Sarah will discover her wet boyfriend plays for the other team and then, hopefully, good riddance to Bruno Langley, surely one of the least faceted actors in the Coro cast.

Langley has gone off to work on the new Doctor Who series but we may not have seen the last of Todd. The Todd-is-gay muddle is based on the experiences of scriptwriter Daran Little, who was married and had children before he came out.

He is determined to get mileage out of his homosexual creation, the first in Coro's 42 years, although Bet Lynch always seemed like a drag queen.

According to reports in the Guardian, Little now wants to give us some uncloseted Todd Grimshaw in a TV special about his new life in London post-Sarah. Puh-leaze.

There seems to be a surfeit of sexual congress on the screens lately, particularly on TV One on Thursdays, following on from the Todd-Karl-Sarah drama we'll see more of tonight. The interminable Between the Sheets is best not viewed in the company of one's granny. She might get ideas.

BTS portrays the sexual awakening of a bunch of, well, old people and although the cast — especially Brenda Blethyn and Alun Armstrong — is strong, this viewer has only been able to stomach one episode, watched through fingers.

Sandwiched in-between this geriatric bonk-fest and Coro, however, is the Caroline Quentin gem, Life Begins. Sex does feature in this drama about a woman struggling to cope with the abandonment by her prat-husband, who has gone off with a bitch, leaving her with two teenagers, money woes and the challenge of finding a job.

Quentin's character, Maggie, also has to deal with loneliness. An ever-so-sensitive friend gave her a vibrator, but she went for the real thing on a drunk night out. That hasn't proved to be an answer, of course, but it's a start — if you can call waking up with a hangover in the bed of a complete stranger a start.

Quentin really proves her worth as a dramatic actor in this series, and won a British comedy award for her efforts. Life Begins is also enriched by the veteran actor Frank Finlay as Maggie's dad, on the cusp of disappearing into the fog of Alzheimer's. Not for him the shenanigans of pensioner sex. He's far too dignified.

As for Maggie, let's hope she — like Sarah Platt — will realise there are some men you are far better off without. Maybe Todd Grimshaw will soon be thinking that, too.