10 Facts About Viv Nicholson

Viv Nicholson's father was a coal miner, but suffered from epilepsy, and was often unable to work.

Viv Nicholson became pregnant at age 16 and married Matthew Johnson, but left him to marry her neighbour, Keith Nicholson, two years later.

Keith Viv Nicholson won the football pools on 23 September 1961.

Viv Nicholson came to feel distanced from the people among whom she had lived, who in turn could no longer relate to her, and she developed an ever greater longing for a much more affluent lifestyle.

In 1970, Viv Nicholson moved to Malta, but the following year, after she was arrested for assaulting a policeman, the Maltese authorities deported her, and she returned to Britain.

Viv Nicholson remarried, but her new husband Brian Wright was later killed in a car crash.

Viv Nicholson entered a mental home to escape from her next husband Graham Ellison, who abused her during the four days in which they lived together; the marriage lasted 13 weeks.

Viv Nicholson's alcoholism became serious during her wealthy years but continued for many years after she had lost all of her money.

In 1978, Viv Nicholson co-wrote an autobiography with Stephen Smith titled Spend, Spend, Spend that was dramatised for the BBC's Play for Today series by Jack Rosenthal.

Viv Nicholson died at Pinderfields Hospital, Wakefield at age 79 on 11 April 2015 after having a stroke and suffering from dementia.