Before Warren Wilson left his editorship at the Express & Star, Wolverhampton, he saw one of the most eventful weeks of his career.

Just days before he took up his new role as managing director of Shropshire Newspapers Ltd, which he began yesterday, news broke of the Queen Mother’s death.

Newspaper staff were on their way home on Saturday after completing the paper’s Sporting Star when the news came through.

But they returned to work to print a special edition of Saturday’s paper with news of the royal death.

Warren, (above), said: “Because our Pink had already gone to the newsagents, I decided to do a replate on the normal Saturday paper. That meant we had to re-output all the plates.

“But that gave us time to bring in a press crew, the circulation guys, scanning department and, of course, the journalists were all coming in, or offering to come in, anyway.

“We changed the front, page 4 and page 5 with the news, pictures, tributes etc and sent that off to late-night outlets and garages, supermarkets, plus British Legion clubs and so on.”

Staff at the Express & Star then set about preparing the first Sunday issue of the paper, a 24-page supplement with 16 pages of colour.

Warren said: “Altogether we used 100 pictures in that. We printed about midnight so that we were ready for the Sunday morning trade in the newsagents.

“Our circulation lads went all over the area with placards to tell readers we had done a special.

“It was quite a week for me. On Tuesday I was introduced to the Queen along with our other directors at the Newspaper Society lunch at the Savoy. Then I had the Saturday replate and our first-ever Sunday paper.

“Talk about going out with a bang!”