Liz Smith (I)

The Royle Family's finest hour: The Queen of Sheba

On the 15th anniversary of The Royle Family's landmark episode, its cast remember making TV's funniest, most emotional hour.

Letter: Liz Smith mixed comedy with pathos

She was a wonderfully talented actress with a fine sense of comedy and of pathos, often delivered together with great effect.

On a night of frantic comic mugging over on Children In Need, here's a welcome chance to catch a genuine comedy classic. It's Liz Smith's finest hour as Nana, stealing the show in this special episode from 2006, which walks the finest of lines between comedy and tragedy. Among the trademark Royle Family bawdiness and burping, a rich mine of emotion is tapped, reminding us how much we'd taken these characters to our hearts.

This hit-and-miss series of comedy shorts continues tonight with a promising offering starring and co-written by former Fast Show star Simon Day. He plays a cheery personal trainer whose clients include a Hollywood-bound actor and a young boy whose mother he has taken a fancy to. Look out also for The Royle Family's Liz Smith in a cantankerous supporting role.

On the very day the engagement and imminent marriage of Prince William and Kate Middleton has been announced, it's only right we celebrate the country's first family. In this special, members of the Royle family share their memories of working on the show, how it came to be, and talk about some of the behind-the-scenes shenanigans. You get the impression that the cast are as close in real life as they are in the show, and Caroline Aherne, Craig Cash, Ricky Tomlinson, Sue Johnston, Liz Smith and Ralf Little share their recollections of a comedy that became a modern classic.

A long but comprehensive look back at one of British comedy's best shows, Craig Cash and Caroline Aherne's kitchen-sink comedy The Royle Family. Anchored by the scoop of bringing the two creative forces behind the show together to banter about their various real-life inspirations, it's really watchable. Even if you've seen moments like Denise and Dave's No Surprises lullaby a hundred times. Famous fans and the rest of the cast - including a touchingly reunited Ralf Little and Liz Smith - are on hand to nominate their favourite moments.