Unpretentious TV abbey mostly covers dirt (4-2-5)
I believe the answer is:
down-to-earth
'unpretentious' is the definition.
(I've seen this in another clue)
'abbey mostly covers dirt' is the wordplay.
'abbey' becomes 'downton' (abbey in TV's Downton Abbey).
'mostly' means to remove the last letter (most but not all of the word).
'covers' says to put letters next to each other.
'dirt' becomes 'earth' (I've seen this before).
'downton' with its last letter taken off is 'downto'.
'downto'+'earth'='DOWN-TO-EARTH'
'tv' is the link.
I am not very happy about this link. It may belong to another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for down-to-earth that I've seen before include "Practical, no-nonsense" , "Far from assuming" , "Sensible - practical - realistic" , "where Newton's apple fell?" .)