“Daddy has gone to live with the angels,” my mum explained to me gently, tears rolling down her face. I felt scared although I didn’t really understand what she meant. It was a sunny July afternoon in 1968 and as an eight-year-old little girl I had been busy plink plonking on my grandma’s old upright piano whilst eating my after school snack of iced gems, oblivious to the fact my world was about to cruelly change forever. I certainly didn’t realise then the huge impact those few words would have on my life.

My Dad and I would do everything together. We were inseparable. I would love to watch him perform on stage from the shadows in the wings as he sang, played the piano and made the whole audience roar with laughter. I would feel a little jealous and upset not wanting to share him with anyone, thinking petulantly “but he is MY Daddy”.

I was an only child to show business parents and not used to sharing anything. I spent much of my early years in musty dressing rooms, meeting a variety of famous people, although to me they were just over-the-top, loud, funny people with thick make up and sparkling costumes, who were inevitably very kind to me. I would watch my parents get ready for their double act, fascinated by the transformation before me and wondering why my Daddy had to put such dark make up on his face. I cried watching Morecambe and Wise being cruel to my mummy whilst the audience laughed hysterically, and cried even more when Tania the baby elephant treated me to an unexpected golden shower when I stood too close behind her. How times have changed!

My Dad had to explain to me countless times that people were laughing with me, not at me, although I never really got what he meant. How much advice, love and words of wisdom have I missed out on over the years? I wonder if he would approve of my life, maybe even be proud of me? I still think of him every day and those eight years of memories are intense and locked in my heart forever.

Yes, I cried my heart out that afternoon in July 1968 but it is only really now over fifty years later that I fully understand what it meant to lose my beloved father.