Ruth Scott knows that anything can happen on live radio. Even meeting your future husband.

“He played a competition on air with us,” smiles the 2FM DJ as she recalls her first encounter with accountant Rob Morgan – son of the late Fr Ted star, Dermot Morgan – who she will tie the knot with next July.

“Then he Facebooked us a few weeks later – myself and Paddy (her former co-host): ‘Thanks, I got my prize.’ We sent him Best Disney Hits or something awful- and he said: ‘I’m having a table quiz on Saturday, do you guys want to come?’ And I saw his profile picture on Facebook and I thought: ‘He’s very handsome, isn’t he? I think I might go into that.’

“And do you know what? He came home on Saturday with a bunch of flowers and he said: ‘It’s five years to the day that we met in the pub that night.’ He was calling it our ‘meet-iversary!’”

Though she admits that love – and now marriage – took her completely by surprise.

“I was 12 years pretty much single and I just never thought I was going to get married,” she says.

“Even now, people say: ‘I thought you weren’t going to get married?’ And I say: ‘That’s because I was single for 12 years!’

“I just didn’t think it was going to happen.”

There is a refreshing candour about Ruth and you immediately feel at ease in her company. A proud Roscommon woman – her claim to fame was getting Tom Cruise to pose with the county’s GAA jersey – she was born in Elphin and lost her father Sean, a solicitor, when she was just five, with her mother Mary rearing the family of eight.

“I don’t know how she did it,” says Ruth, who describes her mother as a “phenomenal” woman who made sure her children had every opportunity, from education to extra-curricular activities – with many happy memories of days out in their two-door Hillman Hunter.

As the youngest in the family, Ruth was exposed to every style of music, from Led Zeppelin to James Taylor, through her siblings, and when she and her mother later relocated to Roscommon town, radio became “a good companion” through her teenage years.

While she missed out on a place in Communications in DCU, Ruth got her first break in student radio during rag week while doing European Studies in UL.

“They put me on the breakfast show every day for four hours – I barely owned three CDs,” she laughs. “And I always remember after the first 20 minutes going: ‘This is really nice; I really like this.’”

Having caught the bug, Ruth sent a cassette tape into 2FM’s DJ for the day competition, and made it to the final five. Encouraged, she got work experience in Radio Kerry and Shannonside FM and sent another tape in the following year, but was actually travelling in Australia when she got word that she had made the final again.

“There was a lot of reverse-charge phone calls,” she recalls. “And I always remember Tony Fenton – God rest his soul – he was so encouraging.

“The final was on in a couple of weeks and he said: ‘We can organise a studio to do it in Australia if you want, but I think you’re in with a really good chance.’ So I kind of thought he was discreetly letting me know that it was better to come home. So I came home ... and I won it.”

The decision to return paid off. Soon after, Ruth got a job with AA Roadwatch and presented a breakfast show in Limerick before 2FM came calling again, with slots from the 6am pre-breakfast show to the late night shift. She also enjoyed a stint at Dublin’s 98FM before returning to RTÉ in 2005 to co-present the breakfast show with Rick O’Shea, and has been a fixture on Saturdays and Sundays with Weekenders With Ruth in recent years.

“It’s a pretty busy three hours and a lot has changed, even in the last few years,” she says, explaining that interacting with listeners on Snapchat is now almost as important as the playlist.

“People would have said if you’re looking at your social media, you’re not focusing on your job; now your job is you have to focus on social media, among other things.”

While Ruth would love to return to radio five days a week, she has actively mined other avenues, appearing as a regular panelist on TV3’s Midday and RTÉ’s The Today Show, studying digital marketing through her Local Enterprise Office, and making a name for herself as an MC, especially for events celebrating female entrepreneurship.

She is also a member of the Healthy Ireland Council, chaired by Keith Wood, where her particular interest is how to support people who don’t have a regular routine – whether it’s shift-workers, the self-employed or even radio presenters like herself – in living healthier, more active lives.

“I am part of RTÉ, but a lot of the time I’m out on my own,” she explains. “I don’t have that fridge in the workplace where I can keep my salad and I don’t have my lunch break every day between 1pm and 2pm, and go for a 30-minute walk, so I suppose I’m really conscious of the people who don’t have any routine – and there’s an awful lot of us.

“I just like the idea of looking forward to our health rather than just stopping and looking at our shoes; and it’s very easy to freeze in fear and not do anything. It’s just: ‘What’s the little thing you can do?’”

To switch off, Ruth likes to listen to podcasts while walking, is partial to a subtitled Scandi drama and recently joined a samba drumming group. Then, of course, there’s the wedding planning: the couple will marry in a humanist ceremony in Bunratty next summer, with a relaxed shindig – think pigs on spits and sing-songs – with family and friends.

“All we have to decide is the honeymoon. Oh, and I haven’t picked a dress,” Ruth adds, though admits that she can’t see herself in the traditional white gúna.

“People say every woman has dreamed of walking up the aisle in a white dress since she was a girl. Never. I have never dreamt of it. I don’t know why!” she says.

Indeed, she jokes that when it comes to the finer details of the big day, Rob is the “bridezilla” of the pair.

“He likes being organised. He’s the kind of man who would laminate a schedule,” she laughs, adding that they are “really happy together”.

“I say this all the time: ‘I’m so lucky I met you,’” she smiles.

See? Anything can happen on live radio...

Listen to Weekenders With Ruth, Saturday and Sunday at 3pm on 2FM.