I saw Bill at the Pavilion Theatre in Brighton some years ago. He was very funny - savagely so. I've since bought a book of his routines in various venues and reading through it, realised that in actuality he had just a few themes and would riff on them as he felt.

At the end of the routine in Brighton, he came down and sat with the audience (it was an informal, tables and chairs, setting, like a club) and offered to discuss anything and answer anything from the audience. He was witty, charming, funny and very intelligent - and with a definite sense of the stupidities of the world. Defiantly pro-smoking - which is what killed him some months later.

As I recall, he started the evening by saying, "Are there any accountants in the audience? If so - leave now. No - I mean it - fucking leave NOW!" Certainly broke the ice...

Bill was good, but - for me - no-one was as ground-breaking and as shocking (at the time) as Lenny Bruce, who was a tortured genius. And let's not forget the great black comedian and satirist, Dick Gregory. Who talks of him these days?