She began her acting career on stage in South Africa and then went on to act in the London theatre at the age of 18. Lister began working in films in 1943, and appeared in such films as The Limping Man (1953), The Cruel Sea (1953) and The Deep Blue Sea (1955).
In 1946, Lister went on a date in London with Neville Heath, a former South African Air Force captain who murdered two women in London only months later. Heath was convicted after a sensational trial, and he was hanged in October 1946.
In 1951, Moira Lister married Jacques de Gachassin-Lafite Vicomte d’Orthez, a French officer of the Spahis, owner of a champagne vineyard and hero of the Rif War; they had two daughters, Chantal and Christobel. Lister also had two grand-daughters, Christina d'Orthez and Marina d'Orthez.
She had a regular role in the first series of the BBC radio comedy Hancock's Half Hour in 1954–55, and was also one of the girlfriends in A Life of Bliss starring George Cole as David Bliss, a perpetual bachelor. She starred in the BBC television series The Whitehall Worrier and The Very Merry Widow from 1967 to 1968. (Later series of this programme were titled The Very Merry Widow — and How!) Lister also appeared on various other British TV series such as Danger Man and The Avengers ("The See-Through Man", 1967). In 1980, she made a guest appearance as a film star in the sitcom Only When I Laugh.
Moira Lister died at the age of 84 in 2007. Both she and her husband are interred in the churchyard of St Edward's Catholic Church in Sutton Green, Surrey.
