A journalist who went from his hometown weekly to the nationals has died aged 63.

Paul Humphreys, left, worked for titles including The Sun, The Times and the Daily Telegraph after beginning his career as a trainee reporter at the Herts Advertiser.

Paul was brought up in St Albans, where the Advertiser is based, and started at the paper aged 17.

During his Fleet Street career he wrote features on leisure and travel., and was a senior sub-editor at the Telegraph.

More recently, he had been living in Kent where he was an associate editor and occasional writer for Saga Magazine.

An obituary in Saga reads: “He was a great character in the office, with an intelligent wit and lively sense of the absurd as well as being generous, warm-hearted and a bon viveur. Widely read and highly cultured, he loved all kinds of classical music, even mastering the alto recorder while at Saga.

He was a great supporter of his local Folkestone literary festival and brought his love of the written word to his work, where his accuracy and rewrite skills were highly thought of.

“His undoubted ability as a wordsmith and craftsman never left him. Despite a multitude of illnesses over his life, Paul never lost his sparkle, wit and overwhelming positivity.

“One of his last text messages to his family said that in the hospice he was ‘resting, wrapped in a blanket of human kindness.'”

According to a story in the Advertiser, Paul died after suffering a lengthy illness.

He leaves a wife and two step-daughters, and his funeral was held on 3 August.