Terry Jones: Monty Python stars Palin and Gilliam lead Colwyn Bay statue appeal

Paying tribute to Jones, Palin said he had “wonderful ideas about life and how things should be done”.

“Terry was a real poly-man, he could do a lot of things. When I first met him at Oxford, he was a very good actor, he was a very funny man, he played the guitar… he would have a go at absolutely everything,” he said.

“He was always very strong-willed and I think his Welshness gave him that feeling of being right. It was rather sad for Terry, aged five, to have to move to Esher in Surrey which is about as un-Welsh as anywhere you could imagine.

“He was a great, great friend.”

Gilliam added: “Terry was a great romantic, always seemed to be looking for a new kind of holy grail and would invariably convince all of us to follow him in these quests.

“His dream of Wales always intrigued me. It was a very romantic dream, as if he was a kid taken away from this beautiful kingdom and dragged off to horrible England… but he always talked about Wales in these beautiful adjectives.”