Caroline Aherne

has died.  after suffering from cancer for the third time in her life. 

1963 - 2016

Admission to the Hollies, September 8th , 1975, number 9734, Aherne, Caroline Mary, Wincanton Avenue, M23.

TV Comedienne, creator of TV's Mrs Merton and The Royle Family, Caroline was born on Christmas Eve, 1963, in London, the daughter of an Irish railway worker and a dinner lady. Both Caroline and her brother wre born with a rare form of retinal cancer. 

The family moved to Wythenshawe when Caroline was two years old. She attended the Hollies Convent Grammar School in West Didsbury, where she gained 9 As at O level,  and then went on to the (then) Liverpool Polytechnic as a drama student. She worked for a time as a secretary at the BBC in Manchester where she met her co-writers Craig Cash and Henry Normal. Caroline also has a cult following on the Manchester live comedy circuits, and worked for a time with Cash on a pirate radio station, where the character of Mrs Merton was developed. After a few shows, both Caroline and Cash were sacked, but their show was picked up by BBC Radio 2, where the character was further developed, and paved the way for her better known television series later.

Caroline's talent for mimicry has sometimes, mistakenly, been attributed to Paula Wilcox (another ex-Hollies pupil). An early character was Sister Mary Immaculate, the witless Irish nun - possibly based on Aherne's first-hand experience of a convent education. 

Do you have any memories of Caroline from school?