Ruth Madoc

As the years go on, my autograph collection - which began in the mid-80s - has become the go-to thing to seek whenever there has been a celebrity death.

I found myself checking it again over the weekend when I found out that Ruth Madoc had passed away.

As a child, I found myself enjoying Madoc on the BBC comedy series, Hi-De-Hi, because of her character of Gladys being Welsh.       

I'm sure that there were many other Welsh characters in the things I watched back then. Gladys Pugh was Welsh multiplied by one hundred.

Other than the autograph, I also saw Ruth Madoc in pantomime here in Cardiff sometime during the 1980s. 

She played Robin Hood in 1984. I vividly recall the star's first appearance in that performance. 

There was a wooden box (could have been a barrel, but I cannot shake off that it was square in shape!) hanging above the stage, there was a big bang and Robin Hood fell from it. This was obviously a trick of the lighting, but little old me thought she must have been in the box/barrel all along.

That panto visit was even more memorable because I recall it was the first time my aunt came along with us. She became a regular fixture with us on those panto visits for years after that. 

I've thought about my aunt, and even those pantomime visits, a lot recently so it seemed surreal that I learned of Ruth Madoc's passing only days after chatting with family about the time we used to go to the pantomimes.