Cecilia Ryder (her maiden name) was born into a large East End Family on September 14 1928 in Hackney East London, the child of Charles Robert Mead and Ethel Myrtle. Her father was in the navy and her mother was a seamstress.


During her youth Celia showed an interest in acting, but at the time this was viewed as as an inappropriate career for a young woman, as her family's only exposure to the acting world was via the Hackney Empire – then mainly burlesque acts and bawdy comedians.


Nevertheless Celia persisted and was awarded a scholarship based on her artistic abilities.


Celia and her family, suffered the ravages of the Blitz, and she curtailed her thespian leanings and went into the teaching profession – teaching at an Inner London school – Chisenhale – and being promoted to the post of Deputy Head aged 27.


Longing to join the acting profession, and much to the dismay of her family, Celia left teaching and joined a small touring repertory theatre company – the Penguin Players.


The Penguin Players toured all around Britain , starting in Bristol and the south west. It was during this time that Celia met fellow actor Clifford Rose, and they were soon to be wed.


They had one daughter and one son in 1958 and 1961 respectively.


As a new mother, Celia devoted her time to her children. Clifford continued to pursue his very successful career, but Celia realised she would have to find a more stable economic platform to raise the children, and so returned to teaching.


After a few years it became clear that Celia had been out of the profession long enough to make returning to acting almost impossible, despite that fact that she had made a number of successful television and film appearances in the meantime.


Celia continued to teach until her retirement when she moved with Clifford to Stratford upon Avon (the town of Shakespeare's birth), where she and Clifford had both started their theatrical careers.


She shortly thereafter developed Alzheimer's Disease, although she maintained a keen interest in literature and film in the early years of her illness.


At the end, my mother could not recognise herself or any member of the family. There were few moments of salvation during the dying process, certainly no moments of epiphany – showing that we, as family, have suffered just as cruelly as all those whose relatives are affected by this, the vilest of diseases.


My belief that Alzheimers is the most pernicious and evil of all diseases is based on logic and medical science. If one has a physical disease – such as diabetes, or heart disease, it can be identified and treated by surgery or medication.


Same too for most mental illnesses, they too can certainly be helped by medication. But what does Alzheimer's proffer? The destruction of memory, of identity, of hope, of dignity. The fragmentation of family. Those awful silences when relatives cannot express their sorrow nor their disgust. The death of the person long before physical death.


Most people who knew my mother would, perhaps, concede that she was a force of nature, and a true east-ender, albeit restrained by the vicissitudes of fate and fortune. I like to think that she was the martial force inhabiting the cockpits of spitfires and was there in the blood and thunder of the war. Still too, I see her back at home, with a gin and tonic in hand, quietly celebrating the peace.