JEREMY VINE remembers Steve Wright – shy, eccentric, beneficiant genius

Standing in Steve Wright’s former studio at Radio 2 this week, I realised a horrible coincidence. As the station is shifting places of work, the studio by which he spoke reside to the nation for greater than 40 years had been gutted simply days earlier than his dying.

The symbolism was an excessive amount of to bear. For Steve Wright — whom I’d name a good friend as a lot as a colleague — that studio was his house.

His preparation and work ethic meant he would arrive at 9am for an on-air begin at three. He did his prep within the studio itself. As mad as this sounds, I calculated that Steve spent round 75,000 hours of his life in a radio studio.

His outdated office nonetheless bears his mark within the smudges within the carpet his chair had made. I’ve so many recollections of seeing him by way of the glass, joking, interviewing, chatting.

Steve Wright (pictured in 1995) spent round 75,000 hours of his life in a radio studio, in keeping with Jeremy Vine’s calculations

Jeremy Vine (far proper) with good friend and colleague Steve Wright and singer Lulu in 2005

I bear in mind his financial institution of old-style ‘cart machines’ — instant-start jingle gamers, which arrived within the Seventies and which he insisted, alongside along with his almost-obsolete CD gamers, must be a part of each refit.

I by no means informed him how we had met. It was 1982 and I used to be a 17-year-old on a household vacation in Newquay, Cornwall. The Radio 1 Roadshow was on the town, and as a radio obsessive I bought all the way down to the seashore early to be within the entrance row.

Radio 1 DJs had been rock stars again then, and Steve was essentially the most thrilling of all. He was the DJ on the Roadshow stage, 6ft above me. Because I used to be the eager chap on the entrance, I bought chosen to play his quiz ‘Bits And Pieces’.

He requested the questions and I used to be ineffective, answering solely six out of ten accurately. Besides the rating, I can solely bear in mind the sharp daylight and being that near my hero.

Years later — in actual fact, greater than twenty years later — I had the fortune to turn into Steve’s on-air next-door neighbour. My slot from 12-2pm had been Sir Jimmy Young’s. I arrived to search out Steve’s present the engine of the community — the sensible controller Jim Moir had employed Steve within the Nineties to assist scotch the station’s ‘pipe-and-slippers’ status.

Radio 2 has gone from energy to energy since. Actually, I’m satisfied he’s a part of the rationale British radio is in such good well being regardless of the avalanche of challenges posed by the web.

Steve was kindness itself to me. But I by no means talked about that assembly in Newquay to him. I could have been unsuitable, however I sensed Steve didn’t need reminding of the Radio 1 years — because the perpetual innovator, he had moved on.

On Radio 1 he made stars of Mr Angry (‘I’m going to name you on the cellulite!’), Gervais the Hairdresser and the Posse. The present on Radio 2 was much less frenetic, however no much less creative — Steve found an impressionist, Lewis MacLeod, whose impersonation of me was so good it fooled even my very own youngsters.

I saved getting letters and emails from older listeners who thought the impressionist was me: ‘You have a younger household. Why are you staying on after your present to make foolish jokes on Steve’s?’

It was an indication of Steve’s courtesy that for at the least a 12 months he’d ask: ‘The impression of you. Are you certain you do not thoughts? We can cease it in case you do.’

Of course I did not. I liked it.

When I gave an interview about Steve’s passing, one other BBC interviewer mentioned: ‘And, in fact, he was the identical off the air as he was on it, wasn’t he?’ I agreed, and kicked myself afterwards. It was nearly the alternative of the reality.

The nice thriller of Steve was that the three hours of radio was the one time when he confirmed off. You would by no means choose him out of a bus queue. He prevented showbiz events. He was humble, even shy. He undercut all his personal achievements. To today I don’t know whether or not I’d name him an extrovert or an introvert. I ponder if, as a colleague has just lately provided, he had made it his mission to unfold pleasure to others as a result of he had identified unhappiness himself.

Even his shut mates knew little about how he spent his time exterior his studio.

He as soon as invited my household to a membership he belonged to in Surrey and handled us all to lunch.

We talked and laughed. He was sensible with my younger daughters. I used to be glad I had by no means talked about my fandom — by no means talked about Newquay. I feel he’d gone past wanting skilled appreciation and wished true friendship.

The solely time I noticed him barely irritated was when he insisted on a ban on ‘individuals with clipboards’ showing exterior the door to his studio.

This, to me, is a basic BBC story. Doubtless somebody was tasked with doing a Health and Safety audit of our flooring, and I’m certain they did it properly. But to immediately arrive exterior the door to the Big Show filling in checkboxes on a type? Not a good suggestion.

Steve usually informed me issues I assumed couldn’t be true, and later frightened may be. ‘When I would like dental work I simply use pliers,’ was a basic. He joked about how ‘I’ve purchased a four-by-four that is too large for my storage, so I’ve to climb out by way of the boot.’

I did not imagine a phrase of it till I noticed photos in a Sunday newspaper of him doing precisely that.

Shyness, eccentricity, generosity, genius: he was a fancy bundle, however above all immensely likeable.

The supervisor who broke the information that Steve had died burst into tears as she informed me. That by no means occurs within the BBC.

The suddenness of his passing has taken our breath away at Radio 2 — there are parallels with Terry Wogan, who might properly have been sick for longer, however who by no means publicised his well being struggles.

Steve was recording Sunday Love Songs in the future, after which he was gone.

If you might be searching for British radio greats, you conjure with names resembling Wogan, Kenny Everett, Ken Bruce, John Peel, Annie Nightingale… it is a matter of style. But I can not think about anybody would draw up a listing on which Steve’s title would not characteristic. Goodbye, good friend, and thanks.

• Jeremy Vine is donating his price for this piece to Parkinson’s UK