Celebrity deaths always interest me, and they often make me sad. When it's someone I've admired, I mourn the loss. When it's someone who dies too young, I mourn the waste. But I always move on.

Today I was profoundly saddened by the death of someone I never knew in person, but felt close to anyway. And you probably don't even know his name. John Ingle played the role of Edward Quartermaine on General Hospital, and his death came just days after what I assume was his last appearance on the show, as a frail old man who could barely speak his only line.

On the show, the character was feisty and outrageous, with a voice and manner that commanded attention. The actor had a talent that brought subtlety into what was sometimes a broadly written role. The character was difficult but endearing. The actor was simply endearing. He lost his wife a few months ago and had gone into a decline, never to return to the full-time job that brought joy to so many fans.

What's special about this celebrity death is that I've watched the show off and on for fifty years, and regularly for twenty, and I knew this character more deeply than I know many people I interact with in real life. Along with the others on the show, he was part of my world and I've felt part of theirs. So it's a deeply moving loss for me.

It's also, I happen to know, a big loss for his co-workers on General Hospital, because I follow several of them on Twitter (all the better to get to know them more intimately). He was beloved and admired by those closest to him, and by those of us who only thought we knew him. I can only hope that the writers will give him the exit storyline he deserves.