A fifty-eight year old man died yesterday after choking while laughing at a television show.
Patrick Tardy of Lower Cotton Hill Grove Road, West Sussex, was having his dinner and watching his favourite programme on Uk Gold - the Eighties Sitcom 'Brush Strokes' - when a particularly amusing set piece involving Elmo and a pub ghost took place on-screen.
His wife Svetlana, 22, tried to help her wealthy husband as he began to cough and splutter when he laughed and swallowed a piece of ham at the same time.
"It was (an) awful noise coming from (his) throat," she said. "He always laugh(s) at Elmo. He like(d) Jacko too, of course. But Elmo always make (him) laugh."
Svetlana tried the Heimlich Manoeuvre but the shock led quickly to Mr Tardy suffering a stroke according to the coroners report that has just been released.
The irony was not lost on actor Karl Howan who plays Jacko, the show's pikey lothario. "The Irony is not lost on me," he said.
