Carrie Bradshaw, Samantha Jones, Miranda Hobbs and Charlotte York captivated audiences worldwide with their entertaining wit, uninhibited sexuality and raw honesty.

Groundbreaking Sex and the City broke all the etiquette rules, and now, some 19-months on, its star, Sarah Jessica Parker, is breaking another one ? although it is not her fault.

We meet in one of Soho's best-kept secrets, a restored 18th century Georgian house, festooned in traditional festive decor, but where stilettoes are banned due to its original floorboards.

"I email the girls all the time and we are in constant communication. Like a lot of my friends who have been neglected over the last 10 months, just because they are out of sight doesn't mean they are out of my mind," says the 40-year-old.

In it she plays Meredith Morton, an immaculately composed New York City-based career woman, whose tailored suits, upswept hair and subtle make-up speak volumes about her personality, making an indelible impression when she meets her boyfriend's family for the first time during the Christmas holidays.

"Carrie Bradshaw is all about introspection and curiosity, looking at the other person, inter-personal relationships and she is really comfortable with her physical person and her skeleton, and easy-breezy and delighted in taking chances and risks. Meredith literally is just counter to that.

"There is that tiny piece of connective tissue between the two of them," she continues, referring to the characters' mutual love of shoes, "but I think the difference is that Carrie Bradshaw lives to wear clothes and I think Meredith dresses because it's required ? there is not a trace of a personality, it is all about what is right, what is appropriate, what is structured and tailored."

But while her fictional character has major difficulties fitting in with the Bohemian Stones, she tells me she had none at all embracing her husband actor Matthew Broderick's family.

"Matthew's father was long-deceased before I met him and his mother and I had actually met because, strange as it sounds, we a travelled in the same social circles.

The couple met in November 1991 and after a five-and-a-half year courtship, married on May 19, 1997, and now have a three-year-old son James together.

With Broderick's commitments on Broadway, where he is starring in the revival of Neil Simon's The Odd Couple, and her own tight work schedule right through to December 21, Christmas will be the first time in a long while the family will get to spend some quality time together.

"He and I went to meet Santa and he was intrigued and he spoke a lot about presents and then he slept on Christmas morning until 10am ? the only time he has ever slept that late in his entire life ? and of course Matt and I were up at six.

"But this year he has made a list and we have mailed the letter to the North Pole and he has spoken of it on more than one occasion ? what he expects to get."

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