1. The day that changed everything

Jamie and Andy Murray in a Davis Cup semi-final

THE most meaningful moment was when the boys won the Davis Cup semi-final tie against Australia in the doubles (September 19, 2015). I was sitting with my friends and family on the Saturday and I was blown away by the noise.

This is the East End of Glasgow where you won’t find any tennis courts. The two players who were coming out to play were my kids. The Davis Cup captain was Leon Smith, who I had mentored since he was 20 as a coach. This was in our backyard. It was our players, our captain.

It was at that point that everything hit me. I could look back to when I played tennis for Scotland and one man and his dog would watch. You would get a line in the sports round-up in the papers. Now we are on the front page.

It was after that – and winning the Davis Cup -–that I knew we needed to ensure there was a legacy in Scotland.

No courts in the East End of Glasgow? That was irritating me. I decided to come away from the top end of the sport to invest myself in grassroots because I can have a much more long-term effect on the game.

I now teach other people how to teach tennis. That is growing the game. More people playing the game need more people delivering the game and to do that we have to take it into places you might not normally find it.

2. The end of innocence

Andy Murray won the US Open juniors in 2004

IT all changed when Andy won the US Open juniors in 2004. He won it on the Sunday afternoon and our flight (I had Jamie and two other juniors with me) was at 8pm that night. But after he wins, somebody hands me this sheet. “What’s this?” I ask. “That’s Andy’s media obligations for tomorrow,” says the official.

We had an obligation to do press. We had no idea about this. The Lawn Tennis Association media people had flown home. So I had to get on to the president of Tennis Scotland to change the flights and get another night stay.

My credit card wouldn’t stand that. I was learning as I went along. When we landed back into Edinburgh, it was a barrage of flashing lights from photographers.

Then they were on the driveway of my house and I just thought: “How did they find out where I live?”

We had three boys in the world’s top 25 and a junior grand slam champion. I told them what I needed and was so sure I would get it. But the guy in charge said ‘we’re not interested in junior grand slam champions, we’re interested in grand slam champions’. Right, I said, I have had enough. I would resign and do whatever I could to help my kids. That was a huge risk. I gave up security.

3. Strictly survival

Judy Murray with Strictly partner Anton du Beke

STRICTLY Come Dancing was a huge thing for me. When I got asked to do it, I could not believe it. I thought: “Wow, what an opportunity.” I didn’t really realise just quite how big it was.

The whole thing was great fun. You are learning how to dance from scratch, you are learning how they make shows. You are out of your comfort zone.

The Saturday night was something else. You had to perform something that you are not good at in front of a live audience and a TV audience of millions, with the lights, cameras... You only have to dance for 90 seconds, and when you survive – that is, get through it – you get a massive amount of confidence.

What I realised afterwards was my confidence grew and grew. The make-up people, the costume people, they make you look spectacular every week. They are absolute geniuses.

It opened me up to a brand-new audience of people who don’t follow tennis. It allowed me to show how I really am, even if I was terrified on the night. I had so much fun with my partner Anton [du Beke] and you make so many friends for life. It opened up a whole lot of other stuff for me in terms of appearing on other shows like The Chase, Catchphrase, Have I Got News For You.

I never imagined that I would be able to do that sort of stuff.

4. Play time

A young Andy and Jamie Murray

WHEN your kids start out playing sport, you are doing it for fun. You have no idea where it is going to lead. I wanted them to enjoy whatever they were doing and to keep on improving.

They enjoyed various sports, but I had no idea where it all would end. It opens your eyes enormously when your kids get to a competitive stage – in our case tennis – because the pool of players is so small in Scotland you outgrow your own area.

So you have to travel to England, then the costs and time commitment become bigger still when they are competing overseas. It was like going on holiday but without the fun, at least for me.

The costs were enormous. I had no idea how expensive the journey would be for the boys, absolutely no idea. It was just about giving them the opportunity. We didn’t have any idea of what would happen in the future.

You are living in the moment. It was a big adventure. And a big worry. How do I find the money?

I had no idea how challenging that would be or how long the whole thing would last. It was nothing about them becoming top players. How could you possibly predict or know that? It was about having fun.

5. Travelling coach

THERE were a series of events that happened within around 18 months of each other that shaped my life in tennis and beyond. One was getting a place on the Lawn Tennis Association performance coach awards.

It was the first year of it and it was their top award. There were 20 people on it and I managed to get a place, which was surprising – one, because I was a female, and two, I was just a part-time volunteer and everyone else on the course was a full-time coach in posh clubs down south.

That led me to getting the chance to travel with the girls under-12 and under-14 teams to other countries.

That opened my eyes on how to develop players, because you are around experienced coaches from other countries. You listen, watch and learn.

I learned about the international junior tennis world, the competitions and the personalities and the level of players. The Scottish national coach job came up and it had been vacant for 18 months, probably because nobody wanted it.

We had no national centre, no infrastructure. It was very much a minority, amateurishly run sport. I had the passion to take that job with its £25,000 salary and £90,000 budget for everything. That kind of job was not going to attract anybody with any track record. But I went for it. And I got it. That set me off on trying to create opportunities for kids in Scotland.

6. Winning the home matches

OUR weather is so bad in Scotland, and we were just a regular family living in Dunblane. We didn’t have money and I didn’t have a car when the boys were very young, so we became very good at creating games and activities to do in the house or in the garden if the rain ever stopped.

Of course, I wanted them to enjoy sport the way I always enjoyed it, so I was always playing with them and so was their dad and their grandparents. The result was that they became very well co-ordinated at a very young age.

That was maybe the start of me creating my own sporty programme and it obviously influences my set-up when I travel around the country to make playing tennis fun for kids.

If kids enjoy something, they will want to do it again and again.

I learned a lot about how to teach kids by observing my boys, how they reacted and what they enjoyed.

I was just playing with them but I realised what the games taught them in terms of both physical and social skills.

It was crucial to see what they were learning through play while not realising it. Those games were easy to organise and cheap to set up.

They form the basis of what I try to do at schools or local clubs with the Foundation. [The Judy Murray Foundation seeks to bring tennis to disadvantaged areas in Scotland.]

7. School lesson

Morrison’s Academy

THE first step in the direction of what turned out to be a life around tennis probably occurred when my parents sent me to Morrison’s Academy in Crieff rather than to high school in Callander.

There was no high school in Dunblane at the time and my parents bit the bullet and went for Morrison’s because they had such a good sporting programme.

Morrison’s was great for me. I was already aware of my love of sport and I had the opportunities to do it at school. It not only kept alive my love of playing sport but sharpened it.

8. Learning the racket

THERE was an important moment for me when I was about 11. I was picked to go to the district trials, which was a sort of talent identity thing.

Then I got selected to go to the nationals. You had to be about 11 to be spotted then because it was all wooden rackets that were difficult to pick up, never mind swing.

It sounds a small thing, just going to national trials, but that was me in the fabric of Scottish tennis as a player. It set me off on a path of being a serious tennis player.

9. University Challenge

WHEN I was in my last year of school I thought I would be a PE teacher but then my teacher told me the teaching profession was in a mess, there were no jobs.

She suggested I went to university and did languages, which I did. But I ended up doing what I always wanted to do in life which is coach sports so that derailed me.

But university gave me an opportunity to play other sports. I played for British Universities at tennis in the world student games and I won the British University badminton championships. I got my degree in French and business studies but it didn’t really help me in my future life, aside from when I travelled as national coach.

10. A volunteer

WE moved from Glasgow to Dunblane on the day Andy was due to be born. Who does that? My kids are 15 months apart so I had to give up my job as a national account manager at a confectionery company.

So I got back to Dunblane and didn’t really know anybody but my parents’ friends. I needed something to get me out of the house and become active so I joined the tennis club.

I discovered they still had no coaches, so I volunteered a couple of hours a week when my mum could look after the kids. That was how I got into coaching.