I was re-watching a film late last night, Big, which always makes me smile. While watching it, for some strange reason I found myself thinking briefly of Michael Jackson and betting that this was one of his favourite films, given his oft-professed wish to hold onto his childhood. Near the end, Bas rang to tell me she'd heard a rumour that Michael Jackson had died. I checked on Sky news and found out it was so. Now, I'm not making any freakish, supernatural claims here -- it was just one of those strange coincidences, the sort of thing I write about so often in my books, for the simple reason that weird connections like that happen all the time in day to day life. But it did give me a little shiver down my spine all the same.

I was never a huge Michael Jackson fan, but I admired a lot of what he did, the way he changed the face of music and what was acceptable for a black performer. I grew up with his songs and videos as a backdrop in the 1980s. I can remember when Thriller was released, and the furore in Ireland over whether or not it should be shown at a time when children might be watching -- those were simpler times!! In the end it WAS shown, and luckily a cousin of mind taped it for me, so I was able to check it out and dig those funky zombies strutting their macabre stuff. Needless to say, given the dark subject matter, it was always one of my favourite Jackson songs and videos!! (Although, in truth, my VERY favourite works of his were the spoofs that Weird Al Yankovic did -- Eat It and Fat -- I can never listen to Beat It or Bad without thinking of those!!) I felt he went a bit OTT towards the end of his recording career, pumping out songs which were pompous or rehashes of better works, but his best tracks were milestones, and even though they didn't grab me by the throat, I did always bear a grudging respect for the man, even as a moody, indie-obssessed teen who covered his walls with posters of The Smiths.

I was curious to see what would happen with his comeback gigs at the O2. Like many people, I wasn't convinced that he could pull them off, and expected it all to end in tears. But I hoped that I was wrong, that he'd come back with a bang and stuff it to all his critics. I was vaguely planning to catch him in action somewhere along the line -- though only once he'd shown that he still had what it took. Now, of course, nobody will ever know, and I think that's a real shame. For all his success, I don't think he was the happiest of people. He made headlines all the time through the 1980s and early 1990s, but I always got the sense that he was a man in control, playing with the media, having fun at its expense and enjoying the wild stories they concocted. I think that started to change with the allegations that he had behaved improperly with children. Those sorts of claims would hit anyone hard, I think, and even though he was never convicted of any crimes, seeds of doubt had been sown, and that can't have been easy to deal with. Maybe the O2 concerts would have restored the spark that seemed to go missing in the mid 90s. Maybe he would have stormed back and started to get a kick out of life again. Maybe not. But it's a shame he won't now have that chance.

I'm surprised, actually, by how saddened I felt when I heard the news. Normally I don't worry much about it when celebrities die, even those whose work had a major impact on me, e.g. Kurt Cobain. In my list of musicians I love, Jackson would be WAY down there, probably not even in the top 100 or more. Yet his work obviously cast more of a spell over my life than I realised. He was a superstar, the sort that seems to be going out of fashion these days, given the exploding nature of the media world -- it's hard for anyone in this modern, access-all-areas world to swamp the music channels and newspaper headlines as Jackson did in his prime. He was a giant at a time when it was possible for giants to be all-domineering, and everything he did was news. Whether I wanted to or not, as a child of the 1980s I was aware of all that he did, and all the rumours about him, and even though I didn't know it at the time, he was a part of my life in a way that stars I cared more about were not. So for that reason, and to my surprise (it's not something I would have thought I would be admitting if you'd asked me this 24 hours ago), I have to say with all honesty -- I'll miss him. I can't say in all truthfulness that I think the world is a lesser place without him -- but I do think it's now a good deal less interesting and colourful. We HAVE lost a star -- in the truest, most precise possible meaning of the word.