Cilla Black ‘knew she was dying’, friend says

Cilla Black was ailing and “willed herself to die”, according to a long-time friend.

The star, who had a string of pop hits in the 1960s before presenting TV shows like Blind Date and Surprise Surprise in the ’80s, died on Saturday, aged 72.

A book of condolence has been opened in her home city at Liverpool Town Hall.

Black told Terry McCann, a childhood friend, that she knew she was going to die and her beloved late husband Bobby Willis was “waiting for me”.

Mr McCann said he had seen the star in Spain during the last year, when she told him she was losing her hearing and eyesight, had arthritis and missed Willis.

“I wasn’t surprised when I found out she had died,” he told BBC News.

“The last thing she said to me was she was going blind, she showed me her hands, she had arthritis,” he said. “She willed herself to die. She said, ‘Bobby’s waiting for me.’

“Her mother went the same way. I don’t know what her mother died of but it seemed she associated it with her mother’s death and she just knew it was going to happen.

“She just said, ‘Look at me, I’m a wreck.’ I was trying to cheer her up. She knew something we didn’t.

“She knew she was going to die and she said she wasn’t going to linger like her mother.

“Her mother was ill for two years and she had the same complaint and she said she was never going to linger like that.”

A post-mortem examination is due to be carried out later to determine the cause of death, but police in Spain have said the indications point towards natural causes. The results may not be officially published for several days or possibly weeks.

One possible theory is that the hot weather might have been a factor, according to BBC Madrid correspondent Tom Burridge.

Since her death, tributes have poured in from figures ranging from UK Prime Minister David Cameron to Sir Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr – who knew Black from the Merseybeat scene in the ’60s.

‘Deep loss’

Sir Paul described her as “a lovely girl who infected everyone with her great spirit.”

TV presenter Gloria Hunniford said Black never really got over the “deep loss” of her husband’s death in 1999.

“Bobby was wonderful. Wonderful as a manager and wonderful as a husband,” Hunniford told BBC 5 live. “She was a one-boy girl and I don’t think she ever got over the vacuum of the loneliness that Bobby left.”

Actress Barbara Windsor said: “I’ve seen her twice in the last few weeks. As always she looked immaculate. But I knew she wasn’t very well. She didn’t seem very well.”

BBC