I'm a huge fan too.
I was once required to supply a comedic review-style song for a particular annual masonic gathering and was struggling with until I had a memory of Jake on "That's Life".
By imitating his moody, deadpan delivery I found the comedy of the subject matter (freemasons/ceremonies/etc) so much easier to expose. The song practically wrote itself and was well recieved on the night.
The biggest difficulty in performing the song is that I can't seem to do it without taking on the voice and mannerisms of the great man himself. I was particularly pleased to be asked when Thackray had ever recorded it.
I can only hope that Jake would be flattered rather than offended by my attempt because, in effect, he wrote it when I couldn't.
Those powerful memories of his performances really inspired me.
With him it was all about the songs themselves. From what I've read he didn't like to perform, suffering badly from stagefright, and seemed to hate celebrity, so you have to hope he enjoyed the craft of writing them at least.