A musician who performed alongside stars including Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Josh White has died just before his 92nd birthday following a short illness.

Scotsman Steve Merrick, born Walter John Pert, of Horn Lane in Woodford Green, was born in a house at the foot of Ben Nevis.

He played the accordion and, by the age of 14, was performing on the BBC's Children's Hour, alongside actress Molly Weir.

Three years later he became the resident singer for the Scottish Radio Orchestra. 

On the outbreak of the Second World War, Mr Merrick worked with the Air Raid Precautions organisation (ARP) alongside St John's Ambulance in Dumbarton, which was heavily bombed in 1941. 

A year later, he was drafted into the Navy and posted as a telegrapher on board the Mayola, which came ashore in Troon, South Ayrshire.

It was there he met his future wife, Italian-born Laura Mazzoni.    

After the war, Mr Merrick launched his stage career while stationed in Hamburg. 

He was a member of the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA), which also included Eric Sykes, Spike Milligan and Tommy Cooper, who would go on to become comic stars of the stage and small screen. 

Before moving to Woodford Green in 1963, he toured the United States supporting singer and civil rights activist - and friend of President Franklin D. Roosevelt - Josh White. 

His career went from strength to strength on his return to London, where he presented his own radio series, Presenting Steve Merrick. 

Specialising in jazz-tinged easy listening, he also appeared alongside Peter Sellers on the BBC's Up and Coming and ITV's The Max Jaffa Hour. 

Mr Merrick later cared for his wife, who endured a long battle with dementia until she died in 2010. 

He is survived by four children, six grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

Mr Merrick’s son, Paul Pert, of Churchfields in South Woodford, said he was proud of the joy his father brought through his music.

The 49-year-old said: "His family are thankful that he was blessed with talent and health enough to enable him to keep working throughout his whole life, bringing such enjoyment to others, doing what he loved the most with such fervour, passion, and complete dignity until the ‘last curtain call’."

Mr Merrick’s funeral was held at St Thomas of Canterbury Church in High Road, Woodford Green, on December 3.