IT was more than 30 years ago when The Mother invited us to a barbecue saying there would be someone there I would probably enjoy talking to. “She’s an actress and director from Liverpool we met at a party at the house of The Friend Who Can’t Be Named for Legal Reasons,” she explained.

“I think you’d enjoy chatting to her. Someone mentioned she used to be in Crossroads” she added, knowing that would impress the housemate, a longtime fan of the soap.

That evening was to be my first encounter with my friend Elsie Hall - better known as actress Elsie Kelly, who died last week at the age of 89.

Married to an Abergavenny man, Gordon (Tex) Hall, she had made the town her second home, regularly visiting family and friends all of whom were delighted when after a long career in the theatre and in TV she achieved the fame she deserved playing the hapless Noreen in ever popular comedy Benidorm.

“It probably won’t last,” she said when we chatted about the role. Little did she realise that over the course of the next decade it would make her a household name.

Despite her success, which was demonstrated last week in the media coverage of her death and the moving tributes from her fellow actors, Elsie never forgot her friends, remaining fiercely loyal to BOST, the operatic society in Birkenhead which she had directed for almost 40 years

Her generosity wasn’t restricted to her acting. After years of joking that he would love to perform on the stage of the Borough Theatre as he had in his youth, Gordon finally gave in to my nagging and agreed to appear in one of my plays and with very little hesitation Elsie agreed to add to her not inconsiderable workload by directing it.

For three months they would leave their Friday night BOST rehearsal in Liverpool and make the long drive to Abergavenny, where Gordon’s mother - also Elsie - would give them a bowl of homemade soup before they headed to bed ready for a full weekend of rehearsals.

“Oh we did enjoy that few months,” she would say every time we spoke. “It was so lovely to be able to come ‘home’ every weekend and spend time with everyone.”

During my tenure as editor of the Tenby Observer one of the highlights of the long drive to the office every week was the chance to call Elsie on the way home and we enjoyed many long conversations about am dram, theatre and the state of the garden in Gordon’s family home, which we bought after the death of his mother.

We last met last summer. “I wish we all lived closer,” Elsie said as we left. “We used to have so much fun with everyone in Abergavenny.”

When she last appeared on stage in the town at a special afternoon at the Borough Theatre to mark the 90th birthday of local theatre legend Brenda Harris, Elsie closed the proceedings with a quote from Camelot. It applied to Brenda and it most certainly applied to Elsie - “She is one of what we all are. Less than a drop in the great blue motion of the sunlit sea. But it seems that some of the drops sparkle. How some of them do sparkle…”