Christopher Biggings tried to stop Paul O'Grady from smoking.
Christopher Biggins remembers Paul O'Grady
The TV legend died suddenly at the age of 67 towards the end of March and whilst no cause of death has been revealed yet, he endured three heart attacks in his life, and now pantomime icon Christopher Biggins, 74, has told of how he once tried to stop him from smoking cigarettes whilst they were on holiday together with the late Cilla Black.
Speaking on 'Good Morning Britain', he said: "It's such a tragedy. We were on holiday in a villa with Cilla many, many years ago in Spain and he'd been told not to smoke by the doctor. I was downstairs with Cilla having a coffee and she said 'Can you smell smoke?' So I went up to tell him, I went up like a matron and knocked on the door. I said 'Paul, you're smoking!' He said 'I'm not', so I said 'Paul, do you think we're idiots? We can smell it!' But within five minutes we were on the floor laughing hysterically."
The former 'I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here' winner went on to add that Paul - who shot to fame as drag queen Lily Savage in the 1980s before eventually launching a television career in his own right - was such a "funny man" who was "just brilliant" but wrongly thought when he first saw him that he would never make it in show business.
He added: "He was such a funny man. We will never see the like of him again, he was so quick-witted, he never used autocue. Everything was live and he was just brilliant. I used to watch him years ago in all those gay pubs in the East End and people would say 'Oh, one day he's going to be a huge star' and I used to say 'Oh, no way!' because you just couldn't believe that [could happen]. He was so clever, witty, and that was what was so wonderful about him. He was witty, quick-witted and he could have everybody laughing hysterically."
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