Sandi Toksvig

He would be so horrified by the misinformation around things like, for example, American elections and so on, just to pick a subject at random.

And he was passionate that he had to tell the truth and that the audience had to believe him because he said, otherwise, I'm just, what am I?

I'm just a mouthpiece.

And I remember on holiday, he once grew most exquisite, very neat, what we used to call a navel beard.

He thought it was marvelous.

He was very pleased with it.

And he went on television with his neat navel beard and he got lots of letters saying, what a marvelous beard.

And he immediately shaved it off.

And I said, why did you do that?

It looked really nice.

And he said, because if they're looking at my beard and talking about that, they're not listening to what I'm saying.

So it was important to him that he said the truth.

Absolutely.

I think about him every time I take a seat in a television studio.

Of course, I stood behind the cameras for years and watched him working.

And I remember him saying to me, he came to visit me in my very first television show that I was doing.

And I said at one point, I said, can I get a glass of water?

And he took me to one side and he said, darling,

You need to learn the name of the person whose job it is to get you the glass of water because they're as important a member of the team as you are.

So I don't want to ever hear you say again, may I have a glass of water?