Bridesmaid got with ancient relative by the end of reception (6,3)
I believe the answer is:
nearly man
'bridesmaid got' is the definition.
I know nothing about this answer so I cannot tell whether this works.
'ancient relative by the end of reception' is the wordplay.
'ancient' becomes 'early' (I've seen this in another clue).
'relative' becomes 'man' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'by' says to put letters next to each other.
'the end of' suggests the final letters.
The final letter of 'reception' is 'n'.
'early'+'man'='earlyman'
'earlyman' put after 'n' is 'NEARLY MAN'.
'with' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for nearly man that I've seen before include "Teenage boy is" , "one who didn't quite make it" , "not the expected success" , "one failing to fulfil his potential" , "not quite a success" .)