Peggy Conlon, landlady at the Dublin Castle, with a treasured photo

AMY Winehouse fell in love with Camden Town.

It wasn’t just where she lived, but where she also worked and played: some of her most memorable performances were in intimate music back rooms.

The area inspired her, entertained her, and its people tried to look out for her.

Her stepmother Jane Winehouse said the attachment to NW1 came from feeling like she could live a normal enough life, and that she had become such a fixture on the streets that – usually – no one bothered her.

“She liked to be around what she called real people,” said Jane. “There is no doubt celebrity affected her, and it was not a normal life to lead, but she wanted to portray herself as strong and she wanted to live as normal a life as possible.”

Misha and Suresh Patel ran Pat’s News in Kentish Town Road – and Amy would come in each day for a pint of milk, a gaze at the papers, and a few treats.

“She was always our first customer, just after we opened up,” said Suresh. “She was always very polite and would say hello and stop for a chat. Her favourite things to buy were blackcurrant super-sour sweets we sold – we’d put them aside for her.”

A shrine builds in Camden Square in July 2011

“She loved penny sweets, and she had thing about ice pops too. She first came in before she got a break in the music world, and initially I had no idea who she was – but she became a good friend.”

Amy had loved Camden before the hit records, working on a stall selling candles in Camden Lock market when she was a young, and then at a fetish clothes shop in the Stables Market.

“She hardly knew what it was they were selling, she just wanted to work,” recalled father Mitch. “But from then on, she always wanted to live in Camden Town.”

Though the shop has moved to a different spot, many of the same staff continue to work there.

Owner Mo Bennani said: “She used to come back and visit. We sold a lot of clothing she used to wear. She had a good eye for it and we knew if we sold something to her, others would be in very soon for similar items.”

Mitch added: “She felt living in Camden Town was like living in the old East End, and like there, there is this mix of white working class people living with black people, Jewish people, Asian people – all Londoners, all the same, all doing their thing together, and it was just what she wanted.”

Amy’s dreams to move here came true in 2003, when her first album, Frank, was released.

“The first thing she did when she got an advance for was buy a flat in Jeffreys Place,” recalled Mitch.

She loved being able to shoot pool at the Good Mixer, hang out at the Hawley Arms, or check out bands at the Dublin Castle.

Other places held a special cache for Amy.

She would eat a fry up at Chris’s Kitchen in Royal College Street, and evening meals would often be taken at the Spanish tapas restaurant Jamon Jamon in Parkway.

Amy loved the restaurant, with its an extended dining area at the back where she could wile away hours without being hassled by fans.

She would invite reporters from the New Journal in for a beer and order plates of Patatas Bravas.

“It was her second kitchen,” recalls ­step­­mother Jane. “You knew if she wasn’t eating at home, chances are she’d be at Jamon Jamon.”

Barbara Windsor and Walk of Fame founder Lee Bennett help unveil a statue in Camden Market

At Chris’s Kitchen, proprietor Chris Kyraciou said she liked a fry-up but would come in with some odd requests.

“I remember her sitting down and telling me what she really fancied was a plate of mashed potato – nothing else, just mash,” he said.  “I didn’t have any so I sent her two doors down to Castles Pie and Mash shop.”

He added: “I remember she would often have to hide in the Old Eagle pub down the road to wait for the paparazzi to leave her doorstep. Sometimes it would get pretty bad, with the paps camped out. She would ask her aunt to come round here and I’d plate her up a couple of breakfasts to be taken back to her flat.”

When Amy was writing music from her Jeffreys Place home, she had an inspirational space almost on her doorstep – Dot’s, the famous Camden Town music shop.

A series of murals of Amy Winehouse have appeared in Camden Town over the last decade

Run by Dot and Noel Fraser, Amy enjoyed being around a couple whose passion for making music matched hers.

Mitch said: “She’d go there all the time to get her charts, and to replace broken strings on her guitar. She would roll out of bed and into Dots. It was like her own place.”

One of her favourite places, however, was the Dublin Castle music pub, where she forged a special bond with the land lady, Peggy Conlon, and the rest of the family who run the famous venue.

“She’d get up on that stage and pack the place out,” said Peggy.

“And when she’d finished singing for us, I’d say to her: would you like a drink? And she would always say, ‘don’t worry Peggy, I’ll get it’. She’d go behind the bar and then, while serving herself, she’d start serving other people so no one would have to be waiting. She was such a young, gifted girl.”

Peggy recalls how Amy’s famous beehive hair-do was a topic of conversation between them, Peggy having boasted the style when she was a young woman.

“We used to love it when she came to see us – she was just wonderful,” she said.

Peggy’s son Henry said: “It was always a thrill to see her return home, come back, at the height of her fame. She was always charm personified with my mum.

“When she came in the place would fill up and she’d joke I’d tipped off the New Journal she was in. “She would stand behind the bar so she could chat to people. And if anyone gave her any cheek, she’d keep their change.”

She played a “secret gig” in the back room during the Camden Crawl in 2007.

Amy Winehouse with Sarah Hurley, the former landlady of The Good Mixer

And then there was the The Good Mixer in Inverness Street – once famous for its Britop clientele, but by the 2000s it had become a place where Amy and her friends would hang out.

Landlady Sarah Hurley first met Amy in 2001 – before her first album, Frank, was produced and she recalls a trick she would play on her.

“She’d come in and drink shots while she was playing pool,” said Sarah.

“She’d order the drink and then wander off to take her turn at the table. You’d be standing there waiting for her to come back and pay – and then another customer would want serving. She could wrap you round her little finger and she always tried her luck – but not in a bad way.”

Ms Hurley has this special painting hanging in her home

Sarah recalls how Amy’s best friend Catriona worked at second-hand clothing store Rokit in Camden High Street – and the pair would meet after her shift had finished to head into the Mixer. Two Australian bar staff, Paul and Gilly, became good friends with Amy – and set up a club with her.

“They all started The Mixer Reading Club. They’d chose a book, go away for a fortnight and read it, and then the three of them would sit in the Mixer and discuss it,” said Sarah.

When fame came, Amy, however, would come in with minders.

“She had these two adorable bouncers who kept an eye out,” added Sarah.

“It wasn’t a pretty side of human nature we saw when she got famous. People would come in, notice she was there, and then call their friends to come and gawp at her.”

Amy would eat at the pub regularly – and loved Sarah’s chilli con carne, served up with nachos and cheese.

“As she got thinner, she would say – I don’t want the nachos,” added Sarah. “Then she said she didn’t want the cheese, until it was a bowl of mince, nothing else. I used to say to her Amy – people will think I’m serving up dog food.”

The friends grew close – and Amy shared her hopes for the future with Sarah. “I will always remember how much she loved family, and how she wanted her own. She wanted to get married and have children,” she said.

“I remember when I was pregnant and three months had passed so I was calling her to tell her my news. It was the day she died.”