English actress Helen Mirren says she takes pride and pleasure in knowing she has earned everything she has in her life.

"Everything I have I have earned. I come from not a working-class situation, but certainly a financially impoverished one. We didn't have a television when I was growing up or a washing machine or a car, but the one thing my parents taught me -- and it was very important for me as a woman – was, 'you must become financially independent'," she said.

Mirren added: "When I became an actress, it was very important to me to become financially secure, and I have always worked. And I am now financially independent, and I did it myself. Nobody helped me. I take great pride and pleasure in that."

Mirren is thankful to have a loyal and understanding husband in Hollywood filmmaker Taylor Hackford, reports femalefirst.co.uk. She says she "admires" her husband, and feels they have the "combination" of admiration and love that keeps their marriage strong.

"I have the incredible advantage in my life of having a husband who is both loyal and understanding and in response I give him back my loyalty and understanding too. We couldn't be married without that. I admire my husband, too, which is essential. I'm not going to sit there saying, ‘Oh, darling, you're so marvellous. You're so wonderful," Mirren told Yours magazine.

She added: "How smart of you and blah blah blah'. but I do think that admiration and love are a necessary combination for a marriage. And I admire my husband considerably."