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I too am really struggling, despite having solved about 30 clues. I'd really appreciate a bit more of a hint with the tight-lipped actor, with 'Stinker, quite idle...' and 'Delivery of rhubarb....' I'm hoping that might give me enough of a start to begin entering answers, but I've still no idea how to deal with the length discrepancies and may just have to acknowledge this is beyond me

Hi Neophyte,

Tight-lipped - See my @94 - the "chat show host" is pretty much universally known then reverse that name to get the, now deceased, actor who is "tight-lipped" because he never spoke (names of the chat show host and actor are first names)

Stinker - hidden

How this helps:-)

Sorry, missed your last one...

Delivery of... - 5 letter homophone/delivery of a synonym for "rhubarb" (as in 'nonsense') will give you a 3 letter word meaning "gathering of kiwis"

'Delivery of' means that it sounds the same when spoken. So, in fact, you are looking for a 5-letter synonym for 'rhubarb'. 'Stinker' is the definition. Difficult to find a hint for that actor without giving it completely away. I'm also struggling in the top right corner. Help with 'musical stops' and 'fold nappy' would be good. There's an obvious synonym for nappy which would seem to fit, but I can't begin to parse it.
As for filling the grid, I don't really know what I'm doing, other than making things look neat and symmetrical. I think I've got the extra words in the down clues, and this has given me the third word in the phrase, but the across section is still resisting my efforts. It would be nice to know the word lengths in the phrase!

Hi Soleus,

Musical stops - % letter "state" as a verb + 2 initial letters - definition is "music stops"

Fold - 6 letter "nappy" (probably the one you're thinking of) but with "base" replaced by "pooiest in the centre" - definition is "fold"

Sorry, % should have been 5 - accidentally had my finger on the Shift key!

Thanks both for all your help. Will persevere.

After an epic struggle I have a full grid but for one cell! Can anyone enlighten me on 'X Factor whenever round figure finishes'?

I've got the 3 word phrase (and the extra words). After an initial go at adding the letters to the grid, I'll come back to those tomorrow...it's not making much sense at the moment!

Actually I think I have the 'X' answer but not the parsing...

I'd appreciate a hint for 'A tense relationship,,,' which is 4D in normal numbering. I think I can see the first two letters and the following triplet, which would leave the last three words . Is the final word the definition? I cannot make this work so I must be doing something (or everything) wrong.