Caroline Aherne

I admired Caroline Aherne a lot. I never really got into the Mrs Merton stuff but I loved the Royle Family. 

Every character was drawn from life, some of them from my own life. 

The put-upon mother with the secret stash of chocolate biscuits that everybody knew how to find. Ours were in the cupboard behind the kitchen door, up high where my 5' 9" mammy thought us kids wouldn't find them, forgetting that we had sussed them out years before and had a wee brother who was 6' and could reach them from the age of about 13. 

Jim glued to his seat and in command of the remote control for the telly. I'll bet a few folk recognise that. 

The wee brother who was always the one sent to get stuff. We lived in Pollok, so we didn't send him to the shops but to the ice-cream van for ginger, cigs and sweeties. He was also the one who had to take the bin out (we lived on the third floor of a block of flats) because he was the youngest and he, like Anthony, complained about it all the time.

Daft Denise, taking it on herself to make the Christmas dinner 'with a twist,' forgetting to defrost the turkey and getting the family - and herself - steadily more pissed as they wait for her to start the cooking. 

Her almost silent boyfriend who drifts into marriage and fatherhood. 

Baby David - so nearly called Keanu (or, as Jim said, Keanu, my *rse). 

Jim stripping wallpaper while singing A Little Bit of Monica...

Nana bedded down in the dining room. 

All written by Caroline Aherne. And told with affection. No satire - or only the most gentle kind. Who knows what else she could have done if she hadn't been struck by so many terrible illnesses, not just the one that finally claimed her life. 

She'll be missed.