As fans of EastEnders will know, Meryl Fernandes has left the soap and her role as Afia Masood, which is of course devastating for Afia’s husband Tamwar, who’s still recovering from the physical and psychological trauma of the burns he suffered in the B&B fire last year.

However, Himesh Patel, who has played the role of Tam since 2007 – and has written and episode of, and starred in, online spin-off E20 – has revealed that his character will find comfort in the wake of Afia’s departure in a “bromance” with the lovable Fatboy, who is of course played by the equally lovable Ricky Norwood.

Speaking to Inside Soap about FatTam – well it worked for Cryed – Himesh explained, “I think Tam and Fatboy are set to have a lot more scenes together, which is great.

“Fatboy is good at cheering people up…”

Himesh went on to reveal that were he BFFs with Tam in real life, he’d be utterly hopeless at cheering him up.

He said, “If I was Tamwar’s friend, I’d be useless at helping him cope. We’d end up being depressed.”

However, despite the forthcoming bromance with Fatboy – for the portrayal of whom Ricky won Most Popular Newcomer at the 16th National Television Awards in 2011 – Himesh said, “We’re not going to see Tamwar smiling for a long while.

“But he still has his sense of humour – it often comes out when he’s having the worst time.

“The writers have always written really good lines for Tamwar in that vein, so I’ve got that to look forward to.”

We’ll see Tam and Fats becoming closer when Afia departs to travel around the world later this month.