Published: 19 February, 2014
By DAN CARRIER

IT was a fitting way to say goodbye. 

Around 50 neighbours of actor Roger Lloyd Pack, who died last month, aged 69, came to see his coffin loaded onto a horse-drawn hearse before forming a ring around it and dancing the hokey-cokey. Fitting, because the dance had been a regular fixture in the annual Lady Somerset street party, which Mr Lloyd Pack and his family had been key organisers of for the past 15 years.

This was a moment for those living close by who had known him away from the stage and their television screens, as a warm, friendly neighbour.

Across town, more than 1,000 friends, family and famous acting colleagues prepared their own farewell at the Actors’ Church, St Paul’s, in Covent Garden.

Among the mourners at the service, and then at a wake at the Pineapple Pub in Leverton Street, Kentish Town, were his fellow cast members from Only Fools and Horses. Sir David Jason, who played Del Boy, and Nicholas Lyndhurst, who played Rodney, were joined by John Challis and his onscreen wife  Sue Holderness who played Boycie and Marlene. 

Mr Lloyd Pack’s standing among the British thespian community saw actors such as Nigel Havers, Cathy Burke, Vanessa Redgrave, Miranda Richardson, Denis Lawson, Lindsay Duncan, Alison Steadman and Joely Richardson pay their respects. 

Footballer Gary Mabbutt, who had been a friend of Mr Lloyd Pack for 20 years, represented Tottenham Hotspur, where Roger had a season ticket. 

Actor Kenneth Cranham had mourners laughing as he described being a young drama student with Mr Lloyd Pack in 1960s London. He also spoke of various foreign trips the pair took together as they got older.

Mr Cranham said: “Roger would always wear his battered old trilby, in the hope of not being recognised. It didn’t work. I remember once we went to see the Northern Lights and we got hopelessly lost in the dreary suburbs of Reykjavik. There was a blizzard blowing horizontally, so we couldn’t see the Northern Lights, and we were lost. In the distance we saw an old lady, so we approached her, and she came to us and said, ‘Alright, Dave’.” (Trigger’s catchphrase in Only Fools and Horses.)

Cricket commentator Jonathan Agnew revealed that Mr Lloyd Pack would pop into the commentary box occasionally when he was broadcasting Test Match Special. He read out a poem written by Mr Lloyd Pack’s youngest son, Louis, called Cricket in Heaven.

Mr Lloyd Pack’s son Hartley also read a poem he had written, which referenced Spurs’ 4-0 win at Newcastle the night before the funeral.

Mr Lloyd Pack had left instructions with his family as to how he wanted his friends to say their goodbyes. He asked me to speak on behalf of his neighbours, so I told the congregation about Roger’s sense of community and how this related to his socialist beliefs. I recalled how he campaigned on various issues, such as protecting Highgate library from cuts.

Friend Nicci Gerrard spoke of how he passed away surrounded by his family. She said: “His last words were that he was fine. And he was fine. A very fine and much-missed man.”

The final word fell to Mr Lloyd Pack’s wife, Jehane, who read a poem she had written about when they first met. 

A horse-drawn hearse later took Mr Lloyd Pack to his final resting place in Highgate Cemetery.