ONE of Wrexham's most loved showbiz entertainers has died.

Tributes have been paid to singer and performer Colin Holt, who died suddenly on Sunday night, aged 79.

Mr Holt, originally from Gwersyllt but who lived on Cefn Road, was a singer, impressionist and all-round performer with a love for sport, most notably his beloved Wrexham AFC.

Paying tribute, former Wrexham AFC director Charles Roberts said one of his first acts when he joined the club was to involve Mr Holt in improving the public address system at the Racecourse Ground.

Mr Roberts said: "I first met him just over 45 years ago when I first became a director at Wrexham AFC, and things needed modernising.

"One of the first things I did was get Colin on the new public announcement system reading out the teams as I knew he was a singer with a good voice. That must have been about 1972, and he was a class act.

"We were from similar backgrounds, I came from a terraced house in Manchester and he came from a terraced house in Gwersyllt.

"When he left school he became a coach painter in Gwersyllt and he was fantastic at that too - the paint looked like it had been sprayed on you wouldn't believe it had been painted."

But it was to be as a performer that Mr Holt made his name across North Wales, the North West of England and further afield.

Mr Roberts said: "He became a professional singer and played with the BBC orchestra at St David's in Cardiff.

"He was a regular on the club circuit in the north of England and issued about five or six CDs.

"Colin sang ballads but he was also a drummer in a local band, and went on to front the Ray Irving band, playing at the big dances of the day.

"He also won a national contest, the talent show if its day - 'Find a Singer' on ITV, singing Moon River."

Mr Roberts added: "He went on to work on the cruise ships and for the last 20 years had a winter residency at one of the big hotels in Portugal.

"He was a very jovial character, always telling jokes and was a great impressionist. He could do an impression of someone within moments of meeting them.

"As well as his family, he met his wife Judith when she was working as a showgirl, the two focuses of his life were football and showbiz.

"Because he was a singer and free in the afternoons he used to meet up with the Wrexham players after training, back in the 1970s in what was a golden era for the club.

"He was a keen sportsman and played golf regularly, at Wrexham Golf Club, snooker, and cricket at Bradley Cricket Club.

"Colin was always telling me jokes and I will miss him doing that, the last couple of days have been tough."

After their time at Wrexham AFC, Mr Holt joined Mr Roberts as a director of semi-professional football club Bangor City FC when they played in England's Conference division, the same league that Wrexham play in now.

Mr Holt leaves behind wife Judith, his children Jason and Alison, and the "apple of his eye", granddaughter Penny.