Ed Byrne is one of those comedians, I think, with whom everyone is at least vaguely familiar. It may be that he is simply ‘that bloke’ to some (as he quipped during his 2009 tour, Different Class) – or maybe even ‘that Irish fella’ to those who know him slightly better – but, chances are, you have heard his name, know his raucous Irish voice, and recognise his signature floppy hair, which he fruitlessly persists in attempting to tuck behind his ear throughout our interview, and his somewhat messy appearance. Little wonder: this week’s episode of Mock the Week marked his 32nd appearance on the show, he tells me, and he has been in the comedy game since university.

Byrne is, perhaps, not quite at the screaming-girls-outside-your-dressing-room level of stardom yet (although, in the bar before his talk, a group of freshers do walk past and giggle, but, as he suggests, ‘‘one of them might have tripped’’). Nevertheless, I wonder how comfortable he feels with the fame he has acquired. ‘‘It’s weirder, I think, than being really famous. If you’re really famous, it’s a bit handier, in a way, because a) you’re expected to have an entourage, and b) it’s not unreasonable for you to assume that people know who you are. Whereas, if you’re in between, you get more awkward moments, where you go into a shop and one person knows who you are and the other doesn’t.’’ He pauses a moment, before visibly assuming a comedy persona. Louder now, and with a flamboyant gesture, he continues, ‘‘and the person who doesn’t fucking hates you for being recognised.’’

As he launches into an anecdote, in which a justified complaint regarding hotel service is misconstrued as a showbiz strop, the presence of Ed-Byrne-the-Comedian is unmistakable: the man across the table from me might just as well be behind a panel on my television screen. But, as welcome as it most certainly is to be treated to a spontaneous, live performance from a professional comedian sitting a mere two feet away from me, at the same time, I cannot help but feel like I am not quite seeing the ‘real’ Ed. Surely, I ask him, he cannot be this ‘on’ all the time. ‘‘The Ed on stage,’’ he tells me, playfully chiding me for forcing him to be so pretentious as to refer to himself in the third person, ‘‘is just me, turned up to eleven, basically. I’m not as funny as that all the time, and I’m not as angry about things all the time.’’ But it isn’t a pretence altogether? ‘‘One thing I try to do is to be as honest on stage as I can be – as true a version of me as I can. Sometimes, you’ll be at a comedy club and there’s a guy on stage doing stuff about “so my girlfriend just left me”. And you’re sitting there, backstage, with the guy’s wife. And I find that, particularly if you get more well-known, a weird approach to your comedy.’’

On that basis, then – if his stage persona is an honest, if not slightly exaggerated, reflection of himself – Byrne must be funny in real life too. Is this is in line with his own experience of comedians, I wonder, or does the funny only tend to come out for money? ‘‘Most of my friends are [funny],’’ he assures me. ‘‘The thing of comedians not being funny off stage, I think, is a fallacy. I know some comedians who are grumpy arseholes, but the majority of comics I know are genuinely very funny.’’

If he is, then, as he insists, surrounded by such funny people all the time, I imagine that it might be all too easy to become a little disenchanted with comedy, but he is quick to set me straight on this point. ‘‘I still very much enjoy it. I generally enjoy comedians who are quite different to me because I can really just park it and not be trying to second guess. When I go to see a comedian who is a friend, and is maybe of a similar style to me, I find myself trying to second guess what they’re going to do.’’ He hesitates for a second. ‘‘But, even then, that can be fun. You’ll say to them afterwards, ‘I thought you were going to say this,’ and you’ll sort of say it as a suggestion.’’

I am surprised to hear such a harmonious portrayal of an industry that I had pictured as cut-throat. ‘‘People think that comedy is quite a competitive business and, actually, for the most part, we’re all quite friendly. And me and my closer circle – and even people I’m not that close with – we have a tendency to workshop each other’s material. We’ll sort of go, ‘yeah, why don’t, instead of saying you stuck it up your arse, saying you got your cock caught in it,’ or whatever.’’ The Union press officer next to me erupts with laughter. ‘’Very lavatorial, there!’’ chuckles Byrne.

This reaction tells me he is not too bothered about keeping things clean, which gets me thinking: is there such thing as ‘inappropriate’ when it comes to comedy? Is it possible to cross the line? ‘‘I went to see Frankie Boyle just the other night, getting ready for doing Live at the Apollo,’’ Byrne tells me. ‘‘And I’m just there going, ‘they’re not going to be able to use any of this!’ I think a lot of it comes down to who that comedian is and where that comedian’s heart is.’’ So who does he think gets it right, then? ‘‘Louis CK would be a perfect example. He’s using words like ‘cunt’ and ‘nigger’ in a context that still manages, even for a white man, to be okay. And you hear other comics – women and black comics – talking about Louis CK and the way he manages to, somehow, say the unsayable, and it’s palatable.’’ He takes a moment to reflect. ‘‘I think there’s no subject that is off limits – there’s nothing that you cannot say – but you have to handle it correctly.’’

And, with this, the press officer, who has been watching the clock for some time, unable to make the unbelievably chatty Ed Byrne stop answering questions, finally stands up and ushers the comedian out of the room, towards the chamber for his talk.

As we hastily say goodbye, I feel like, rather than getting to know him better, I have discovered that I actually knew ‘that bloke’ Ed Byrne pretty well all along. He is, in person, just as he is on telly: charming, effervescent and a natural comedian. There must, surely, be an off switch somewhere (although he certainly did not use it during our time together) but he is, I suspect, deep down, simply that funny.