A kind and generous colleague, mornings won’t be the same without Carolpublished at 07:28 BST

07:28 BST

Matt Taylor
BBC Weather

Carol and Matt smiling together outdoors at Wimbledon with crowd seated on hill behind them on a bright summer dayImage source, Matt Taylor

Carol has been one of my closest friends since the moment I joined the BBC, so much so that my own (now teenage) daughters still refer to her as “auntie” Carol.

She did my initial on-air training, and (metaphorically) held my hand when I first started on Breakfast. One of her first pieces of advice to me was to “be yourself, or the audience will find you out”.

It was a simple but valuable piece of advice that I have lived by, and I can honestly say that Carol has lived by it too.

What you see of Carol on air, you get off air too – an amazingly kind and generous colleague and friend, cheekily naughty, with awful jokes that would make even tumbleweed groan.

The only problem was – on the rare occasions we were on the early shift together – we would always end up behind on our work due to nattering and laughing too much.

Mornings won’t be the same again!

Carol playfully pulling Matt’s ear, both smiling with humorous expressions in a newsroom filled with bright lights, desks and equipmentImage source, Matt Taylor