In 2004, Garrett was one of the participants in the first series of the celebrity talent contest "Strictly Come Dancing"; she and her dance partner Anton du Beke finished third. In the same year she took part in the BBC's "Who Do You Think You Are?", a genealogy documentary series, in which she journeyed through her home town of Thorne in search of her family history. She was delighted to discover that the musical gene stretched far back and had run in her family for several generations: her maternal grandfather made a living playing the piano with a small orchestra that accompanied silent films at cinemas in and around Sheffield. A great-grandfather was a travelling musician, working across northern England in the 19th century, playing to workers in pubs and clubs. During the First World War he entertained troops on the piano. Garrett is a veteran of Dictionary Corner on the Channel 4 game show "Countdown", and in June 2005 it was thought that she was to become one of the show's rotating guest hosts while Richard Whiteley was recovering from illness. After Whiteley's death, however, the plan for rotating guest hosts was abandoned and Des Lynam took the role for the next fifteen months. Garrett did not appear on Countdown again until October 2009.