ALAN FREEMANFew radio broadcasters have made as great an impact as Alan "Fluff" Freeman, who died on 27 November, 2006, aged 79.
Over a 40-year career in UK radio he practically invented the genre of the "personality DJ" with his flamboyant presenting style and famous catchphrases like "not 'arf" and "greetings, pop pickers!"
It was a style that became much parodied, notably by the TV comic Harry Enfield whose character "Dave Nice" was based on him.
Yet despite the lampooning, he never lost the affection of the British public which had first taken him to their hearts as the presenter of the chart show in the 1960s.
Alan Leslie Freeman was born on 6 July, 1927, in Melbourne, Australia and initially worked as an accountant for one of the country's largest timber firms.
He had originally wanted to be an opera singer, but after deciding that his voice was not strong enough, he auditioned in 1952 for a job as an announcer and commenced working for a Tasmanian radio station.
But sensing the looming impact of rock'n'roll in Britain, he took the decision to leave Australia, and landed himself a job as a summer relief disc jockey on London-based Radio Luxembourg.
In 1961 he moved to the BBC Light Programme, presenting the Saturday evening show "Pick of the Pops" for the next ten years.
During this time Mr Freeman was also one of the original team of presenters of BBC TV's Top of the Pops and a regular member of the Juke Box Jury panel.
In April 1972 he joined the ranks of daily presenters on Radio 1, presenting his iconic Rock Show, featuring heavy and progressive rock and a regular rundown of the current album chart, from 1973 until 1978.
He left the BBC to work for Capital Radio from 1979 to 1988, but returned in January 1989 to revive both The Rock Show and Pick of the Pops, before leaving again along with other long-serving DJs in 1993 when R1 was revamped.
But he enjoyed a final last hurrah on BBC Radio 2 from 1997-2000, before arthritis got the better of his hands. He also suffered from asthma aggravated by a 60-a-day smoking habit.
His nickname "Fluff" was apparently derived from his fondness for wearing a loose-fitting submariner's pullover given to him by his mother, Annie, which has come back from the cleaners looking like a shapeless ball of fluff.
It was to his credit that Mr Freeman could appreciate the ludicrous side of his public persona, appearing as himself in the satirical TV special “Smashey and Nicey, the End of an Era” in 1994.
But perhaps the greatest accolade came from fellow DJ John Peel who said: "Fluff was the greatest out-and-out disc jockey of them all."
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