MAD as it seems, it was an interview that I wasn’t at all sure I wanted to do.

After all, it wasn’t long since I’d sat opposite another actor who was also a comedy hero – only to leave, bewildered by a performer who seemed at odds with himself and the world.

So when I got another call from my theatre PR pal, equally bruised by her week-long efforts to get positive interviews out of a comedian who seemed to have misplaced his sense of humour, I was wary.

“I know. I should have warned you,” she said. “But at first I thought it was me he didn’t get on with. Then I thought you’d never believe me – how difficult and unhelpful he is.”

The tone was definitely repentant, even a bit wheedling.

“This time it will be fine. This actor is a different kettle of fish altogether. He’s a lovely man.”

Well she would say that, wouldn’t she?

But I had to agree. After all, for years that’s how Richard Briers had captured the hearts of a nation. By being the sort of performer who could not only make you sigh contentedly knowing whatever show it was it was in safe hands. But by being able to light up screen and stage with his warmth, his intelligence and his sense of fun.

Here was an actor with talent and a definite twinkle.

But having just had my ears singed by talent having a tantrum, I was perhaps right to be worried.

Wouldn’t it be awful if another of my screen heroes turned out to be like my out of sorts comedian whose star as far as I was concerned hadn’t just waned but ceased to shine?

But of course, I gave in. I mean, how many people get a job this good?

And how glad I am that I did.

On a summer Saturday afternoon I watched Richard Briers and Peter Egan in cracking form on stage in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.

Would he be as good an interviewee as he was a performer? I was about to find out.

The man who wandered barefoot into his dressing room, his hair still damp from the shower couldn’t have been sunnier. He was worried that he’d kept me waiting.

Chekhov and a baking hot Manchester afternoon were apparently a steamy combination.

“You do take your life in your hands on tour,” he grinned, recalling a worse roasting still in Bath where he played Lear when the temperatures on stage had hit 103 degrees.

A knock on the door was followed by the face of Peter Egan who was off with fellow actor Jimmy Yuill in search of fresh air and refreshment.

They were keen that Richard Briers should follow. Near neighbours in Chiswick, the two were clearly mates and not averse to a laugh.

“Peter’s a bit of a giggler,” said Richard. “I have to say a line in the play, ‘All he was was the son of a sexton.’

“Last night I couldn’t remember the word and eventually said – chorister! Peter had hysterics.”

That interview was more than 20 years ago but it was brought vividly to mind with the sad news this week of Richard Briers’ death at the age of 79.

That long ago day we chatted about his family, about theatre, television and of course, about Kenneth Branagh, the man Richard Briers reckoned had brought something of a renaissance to his career.

“He’s transformed my life,” he said. “It’s great to be an all round actor. I’ve done a bit of fielding, a bit of bowling, keeping wicket and batting!”

And he illustrated the point with a story about how he and his actress wife, Ann had spotted two theatre posters while on tour in Newcastle.

One was for a production of Lear by Branagh’s Renaissance Theatre Company in which Richard Briers had played the title role.

“The other was for Les Dawson in Run For Your Wife and I said, ‘I’ve done that as well.’”

“A good actor should be able to do both. Well at least have a go at Lear!”

And that last remark certainly sums up the Richard Briers I met.

For an actor who dominated our television screens for years, he could not have been more modest, more self-effacing and downright good fun.

“Life is very ordinary,” he said. “I walk the dog twice a day when I’m home. I collect second-hand gardening books.

“I like gardening. Well,” he joked, “I cut the grass and do the edges.”

And talking of neighbours, what about that man Tom? Would it be such a Good Life with him over the garden wall?

“I wouldn’t want Tom for a neighbour,” he said happily.

“I’m more like Jerry. I think I would have to move.”

Listening this week to Penelope Keith, Richard Briers’ co-star on The Good Life, I thought she summed him up perfectly.

“He was what it said on the tin; a thoroughly nice chap” .

And a hugely talented one too. A good life then and one that was anything but “ordinary.”