Ian Brown gives evidence in Fred Talbot trial

Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown has told a court of the moment former TV weatherman Fred Talbot invited a boy to sleep in his tent.

Talbot is on trial accused of indecently assaulting several teenage boys on school trips to Scotland, and other charges.

Brown, 54, was a pupil at a grammar school in Manchester where Talbot taught biology in the 1970s.

The singer told Lanark Sheriff Court on one camping trip, to which a select group of 12 to 20 pupils had been invited, Talbot invited one of the boys to a pub while everyone else stayed at the campsite.

He added that when they returned his friend came back to the tent and tried to get into his sleeping bag.

Brown told the court: "Five minutes later Mr Talbot popped his head in and said: 'I thought you were going to stay in my tent tonight?"'

Brown said the boy went with Talbot and he "didn't really think anything of it at that point".

But next, he said, the boy came back into the tent "in a state", and claimed the defendant had tried to perform a sex act on him.

Mr Brown said: "I've never forgotten it, I was shocked."

On the minibus home Mr Brown said he was seated behind Talbot and saw that he was looking at a pornographic magazine with another pupil.

Talbot eventually left teaching and went to work for Granada TV in northwest England, becoming best known for presenting weather forecasts from a floating map on ITV's This Morning in Liverpool.

In cross examination, Brown said he left school before Talbot began to appear on TV but was aware of his career because "he was on the TV every night".

When defence lawyer Alan Gravelle asked him why he had not raised the alleged incident with authorities previously, Brown said: "Every time I saw him on TV I told people this story.

"I've told hundreds of people the same as I'm telling you here."

Mr Gravelle then asked the singer if he had ever tried to tell Talbot's TV bosses when he appeared on ITV shows with the Stone Roses.

Mr Brown said: "What, break off from my band and tell a cameraman or something that the weatherman's a nonce? It's not realistic."

Later, a man told the court he was "petrified" when Mr Talbot indecently assaulted him on a trip to the Caledonian Canal in 1979.

Talbot is accused of carrying out the offences involving pupils aged 15-to-17 on trips in Scotland while he was employed as a school teacher.

He faces eight charges of indecent assault between January 1978 and November 1981 and one of lewd, indecent and libidinous behaviour in February 1978.

He denies all the charges.

The trial continues.