SHEILA Hancock was being brutally honest.
Her husband John Thaw was one of Britain’s favourite actors when he died in 2002.
But she believed that as future generations moved on and new stars emerged, he would mostly be forgotten.
It’s a sad inevitability that young viewers of the future will not know anything of John.
Unless they catch repeats of the likes of Inspector Morse, The Sweeney and the wonderful Goodnight Mister Tom.
Or read her moving book The Two Of Us – My Life With John Thaw.
There’s another book on John which I contributed a chapter to.
But as none of the contributors were paid in a saga that ended up on BBC1’s Watchdog, I don’t recommend you buy it.

THERE’S a documentary on TV tonight which might just save your life.
Not that you’d know it from this rather bizarre image, one of several BBC publicity pics issued to tie in with the Horizon film.
It shows, at least in part, Prof Myer Glickman, from the Office of National Statistics.
I use it here, as it almost certainly won’t appear anywhere else.
Perhaps it’s me? Am I missing something?
Myer tells BBC2’s cheerily-titled How To Survive A Disaster: “We would normally classify any death before the age of 70 as premature death.”
Almost three quarters of which are preventable.

THE end of another long and varied week is in sight.
It began on Sunday night with coverage of Roxanne Pallett being frozen out of Dancing On Ice.
And continued back at the keyboard at dawn today with the story of Gary Barlow and his Comic Relief team reaching the summit of Kilimanjaro.
Along the way I spoke to University of Manchester team captain Matthew Yeo on Monday night, just minutes after rivals Oxford were disqualified from University Challenge.
Spent a day on location in Stretford on Tuesday with the new series of The Street for interviews and behind the scenes coverage when it returns to BBC1 later this year.
Wrote about current shows like Shameless, Coronation Street and Law and Order: UK.
And revealed all about The Royle Family’s return for Comic Relief.

THERE just had to be one final twist to the Gail Trimble story.
News broke online around 10pm last night of a BBC probe into claims about the winners of this week’s University Challenge grand final.
It appears one member of the Corpus Christi Oxford team ceased to be a student during filming of the series.
Sam Kay (far left in pic) had been studying chemistry.
But during the team’s campaign towards ultimate victory, led by captain Gail, he left the college to work as an accountant.
Sam told today’s Observer here that he was a student during the first two rounds before graduating last June.
While at least one member of the University of Manchester team, who finished as losing finalists, reckons that breaks the rules.

ASK most actors about reality TV and you’ll get a similar answer.
They hate it.
It pushes more expensive drama off the screen and results in fewer job opportunties for them.
But some, including Law and Order: UK star Freema Agyeman, have a different view.
There wasn’t room to include her thoughts on reality television in this week’s MEN TV feature interview here.
So for those who are interested, here’s what Freema had to say:
“I love reality telly. I must confess, I do watch it,” she told us at the launch of the new ITV1 series.