As she steps up to receive her certificate of graduation, Marion Courtney, of Church Street, will be thinking about her late daughter, Susan Davies, who persuaded her mother, at a time of life when most people are putting up their feet and relaxing, to embark on sevens years' of study to get her degree.

Mrs Courtney, 83, said: "I owe it all to my daughter, who died from cancer seven years ago as I had just started my degree. She made me promise I would finish it and do the extra year to get my honours.

"She was behind me every step of the way and I know she knows I have got it. She had a great faith and so do I."

Mrs Courtney was a registered nurse but what makes her determination to finish her degree all the more remarkable is that she left school at 14 without any academic qualifications, before the outbreak of the Second World War.

"I had always wanted to be anurse, but without any school certificates would not have been able to. But because of the war, they were crying out for nurses, so I took an entrance test as soon as I was 18."

She nursed for 53 years, retiring at the age of 71. After training and nursing in London, she moved to Suffolk in 1954 and worked at Lowestoft Hospital first as a casualty nurse for 13 years, then as assistant matron for six years and a nursing officer (matron) for seven years. Then she returned to London where she worked part-time for another 13 years, returning home to Suffolk at weekends and on days off. She finally waved goodbye to the NHS in 1981.

Mrs Courtney moved to Harleston in 1999 to be nearer her family and, encouraged by her daughter, started her Open Unviersity course in 2001.

She said: "I loved the studying but I hated writing essays. Writing essays was my nightmare – my absolute nightmare. All my life I had dealt in facts, so I found it difficult to write 3000 to 4,000-word essays."

She also learned to use a computer for the first time.

"I enjoyed it all. If I can do it with no real academic background, then anyone can do it. It's a case of making your mind up and buckling down to it."

In addition to losing her daughter to cancer, Mrs Courtney also lost her son 30 years ago when he died in a car accident. She has nine grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren, some of whom were studying for degrees of their own at the same time.

Tomorrow, she will be accompanied to the ceremony by her son-in-law and daughter-in-law, her brother and, if she is able to travel, her aunt who is in her 90s.

A total of 390 students from across the South will receive their Open University degree certificates at the graduation ceremony in Ely Cathedral tomorrow.

Also from the Diss Express area will be Sean Moran, 59, retired, from Diss, who has a LLB (Honours) degree.