The call came through in the early hours of a dark, damp morning last March, writes GEORGE FREW. As soon as Ardal O'Hanlon heard the phone ring, he was filled with a sense of foreboding.

Minutes later, he knew he'd lost a good friend, the man who'd been his companion on the road to success and celebrity.

Dermot Morgan - known and loved by millions as Father Ted - had died of a heart attack, less than 48 hours after they'd finished filming the final episode of the last series.

"We finished filming on the Friday and the last thing I said to him was that we must have a good long chat," he recalls. "When the phone rang that Sunday morning, I had a premonition that something awful had happened. We'd had a bit of a party after the show and my dad, who's a doctor, was there and he remarked how poorly Dermot was looking. But everyone's wise in hindsight, aren't they?" Father Ted was the show that made Ardal O'Hanlon famous, but he was already well-known as the purveyor of a particularly gentle, observant and whimsical brand of stand-up comedy that owes nothing to filth, smut, swearing or innuendo and everything to a sense of humour that is firmly based on the absurdities of life.

After a summer spent at home in London with his wife Melanie and daughter Emily, he's back on the road with a new show which reaches the Oxford Playhouse for a two-night run opening tomorrow.

"When I first did stand-up in London, I was playing to kind of knowledgable comedy club audiences, but now I get a pretty mainstream crowd, which lets you know how good you are.

"The material is all new - when I'm writing, I never think if the audience will like it or not. I just go with what I find funny and hope that they will too. I don't do near the knuckle stuff and I don't swear - I don't think that an audience would accept that from me anyway, even if I was interested in doing that sort of stuff."

He sounds cheery enough during our conversation and the only time a hint of sadness enters his voice is when he mentions Dermot Morgan. "The last Father Ted we did would have been the final show anyway, even if Dermot hadn't died," he observes. "We all said that there was no way we'd do another series. Three was just right. We didn't want the standards to slip and we were all moving on to other things. It was over."

He continues: "It's very odd, you know - when we weren't working, I didn't see Dermot all that much and from time to time I'd say to myself, 'Oh, I must give Dermot a ring' - and I still find myself doing that and have to remind myself that he's gone."

Ardal O'Hanlon is a likeable, easy-going sort of man. There will never be another series of Father Ted, but in the end, perhaps that's the right thing - it follows the showbiz adage about leaving your audience wanting more.

Just like the O'Hanlon stand-up routine. Which also proves that you don't have to be nasty to be funny.

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