Elizabeth Taylor was stunningly beautiful, a wonderful actor, and seemed to be (to the extent that one can infer about public personalities by their public actions) a nice person who supported many worthy causes (especially AIDS prevention and treatment in its early days when many did not want to be associated with it) but who unfortunately could not seem to find happiness in her private life and battled many illnesses and personal demons.

She is the only famous actor that I have seen in person. It happened sometime between mid 1962 and 1963 when I was living in England for a year. My parents were friendly with an executive at Pinewood Studios and he invited my mother and me to spend the day visiting the studios and wandering around the various sets. At lunchtime he took us to the cafeteria and there was Elizabeth Taylor at an adjoining table. They were shooting some final scenes from her epic Cleopatra and she was in costume, famous hairstyle and all.

Of course my mother, a big fan, was far more excited by seeing Elizabeth Taylor than a boy like me who would have preferred to see the action heroes of that time. But even at that age I could tell that she was really pretty and this is the image that I will remember her by.