Broadcaster Coren, genial Sage of Cricklewood, leaves £3m in his will

Broadcaster and humourist Alan Coren, a panelist on BBC Radio 4's The News Quiz for 30 years, left more than £3.1million in his will.

Coren, who died of lung cancer, aged 69, left his estate in trust to his wife of 44 years, Anne, and their children, Giles and Victoria, who are both journalists.

He drew up the will three weeks before his death last October, according to Probate records.

Coren was editor of Punch magazine for nine years and wrote nearly 20 books, as well as regular newspaper columns.

He was known as the Sage of Cricklewood due to his fondness for writing about the North-West London suburb where he lived.

Coren, a lifelong smoker, was diagnosed with cancer last year.

He had previously battled back to health after spending four weeks in intensive care in a French hospital fighting septicaemia that developed from an insect bite while on holiday in 2006.

Meanwhile, music mogul Tony Wilson, who founded Factory Records and Manchester's world-famous Hacienda nightclub, left just £485,000 in his will.

The former journalist, who died of a heart attack last August, aged 57, following kidney cancer, launched the label in 1978 and signed Joy Division, who later became New Order.

His other bands included Happy Mondays. However, Factory Records collapsed with debts of £2million in 1991.