In 1997, 11 years before he became mayor of London and 15 before he noted, on Letterman, that he "could be president of the United States", Boris Johnson tried to become the MP for Clwyd South. At one point he told me: "What's behind what I'm doing, really, is a chronic feeling of self-loathing."

Boris carried three "learn Welsh" cassettes in his Jag and utilised handy phrases such as "iechyd da!" ("Cheers!") and "pysgod a sglodion, os gwelwch yn dda" ("fish and chips, please"). But the only time he made "a determined fist" at a campaign speech in Welsh was in part of the constituency where no one spoke it. "I think I make such a prat of myself. Some wonderful people on a farm asked me to get up at the absolute crack of dawn to go milking. In retrospect I probably should have done it. Because I do know which end of a cow to pull, roughly speaking."

During lunches in "glorious pubs" he enjoyed getting "quite drunk" on cwrw (beer). At the Hammer Arms in Wrexham he incorporated innuendo – "bum steers" – into his discussion with farmers. Debating agricultural subsidies, Boris declared: "Look, I'm rather pro-European, actually. I certainly want a European community where one can go and scoff croissants, drink delicious coffee, learn foreign languages and generally make love to foreign women."

Returning, after his resounding defeat, to London – where his father-in-law cooked a hefty commiserating lasagne – I asked if Boris recalled constituents' names and faces. "I tend to remember things like whether they had dung on their foreheads, or whether they told me a recipe for making brandy by boiling up Weetabix and blackcurrants."