The original image of the BBC was like a middle aged aunt of the mid 20th century with somewhat more conservative social morals than commercial broadcasters, especially for childrens and youth programming (this was one and the same until the 1980s!)

it was also not uncommon even in the 70s/80s to refer to any older person as “uncle” or “auntie” whether or not they were blood relatives and thus older presenters of childrens programmes were also called Auntie or Uncle. This took a bit of a knock in recent times because of a certain “Uncle Jimmy”..