Like many people I was saddened to hear of the death of actor John Savident, who was most well-known for playing Fred Elliott in the soap opera Coronation Street, who died aged 86.

I remember my mam was a fan of the show and she used to faithfully record every episode so she did not miss out. I remember he was quite the character who made his mark on the show.

Bizarrely he rocked up in Newcastle in January 1998 to endorse an anti-smoking campaign. It was quite the experience because he was totally in character and he must have scared the life out of the underage kid who was trying to buy tabs – for the benefit of those who are not from the north east that means cigarettes.

It was a pleasure to witness his performance and it showed what a quality actor he was. Let’s just say it was a powerful performance to say the least.

And it was good to see that one of the pics was used by the Northern Echo the following day. For the record I do not have an original scan of this shot so I had to use the original cutting.