Today, 2nd March 2015, it is 16 long years since we lost Britain's greatest female pop singer, the one and only Dusty (real name, of course, Mary Bernadette Catherine Isobel O'Brien) who passed away from cancer aged only 59, one month short of her 60th birthday. I remember her when she was with **** Tom (real name Dion O'Brien) and a guy named Mike Hurst as The Springfields trio, Tom's song "Island of Dreams" was my favourite and her solo recordings are second to none. What a voice she had. Yesterday on the radio, "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me", 49 years old this month, was played and I just had to sit there and let it waft over me and had goose bumps over my goose bumps by the time it finished. It was her only number 1 and I'll never understand why she didn't have another, although she got close at number 2 when she teamed up with the Pet Shop Boys in 1987 with "What Have I Done To Deserve This?" The following year, she teamed up with Richard Carpenter and they produced a beautiful ballad called "Something In Your Eyes" which is on one of my many Dusty CD's and that leaves you aching for more too. My own especial favourites are "Going Back", "I Close My Eyes and Count To Ten" and her gut-wrenchingly beautiful interpretation of the Randy Newman song "I Think Its Gonna Rain Today". Dusty, like her American counterpart Connie Francis (and I heard "Who's Sorry Now?" on the radio yesterday too) didn't just sing songs, she ACTED them too, putting her heart and soul into the lyrics, as seen to good demonstration of the oft-shown clip of her with Burt Bacharach at the piano singing "A House Is Not A Home." It is just so sad she died so young. So let's have a BIG round of applause for Dusty, folks, on this sad anniversary. R.I.P. you lovely lady


***** B R O T H E R, for crying out loud. This pathetic censorship of perfectly normal and acceptable words don't half give me the pip.