AN ELECTRICIAN who never stopped smiling has lost his battle with cancer at the aged of 43, only weeks after being diagnosed.

On July 23, Paul Coates could not have been happier. He was spending the evening with his father, Eric, younger brother, Stephen, and partner, Donna Clarkson, watching his favourite band, Madness, perform live at York Racecourse.

A few days later he started developing indigestion problems and soon he had become so bloated his family said he looked six months pregnant.

When surgeons at York Hospital operated on him, they discovered stomach cancer. Paul died on September 16 in St Leonard’s Hospice.

Stephen said: “On the last day, I was telling him stories about when we were kids. Throughout his life he was always smiling, and he was still smiling then.

“He smiled and then he was gone. We were all there, Donna, Dad, me.”

Paul, who grew up in Acomb and went to the former Lowfield School, lived with Donna in Clifton, and ran his own business, PC Electrical York.

When he was 16 he bought a 1959 Austin Healey for £200 and spent the next six years rebuilding it, helped by his father.

The car was featured in Classic Cars Magazine in 1989 and went on to be displayed at the National Classic Motor Show at Birmingham National Exhibition Centre in 1995.

Stephen said: “He was a role model for me. I looked up to him in admiration. You knew you could always phone him up and say ‘I’m struggling’ and he would drop everything to come.

“It is not a life extraordinary. It’s just a bloke who was so nice and had time for everybody, being understanding and just being a bundle of fun.

“In the last three years of his life, since meeting Donna, he was the happiest and most content he has ever been. They just lived for each other.”

Eric said: “It’s been a really sorrowful thing, a father losing his son. Paul was one of the nicest blokes you would ever come across.

“He was liked by everybody and he was a real smiler.”

Paul’s funeral took place yesterday at York Crematorium.