‘He was the glue’: Liam Payne remembered as a ‘gentle, beautiful soul’ by Richard Wilkins after sudden death

‘Liam Payne has died’. Nine’s Entertainment Editor Richard Wilkins couldn’t believe those four words were true when he first read the news on Thursday morning.

“He was so young and had so much life ahead of him,” he tells 9honey Celebrity, just hours after the news broke.

“He should have a long, rich life ahead of him, enjoying everything that comes with fame and fortune. To see his life cut short at the age of 31, with a seven-year-old son … it’s just so sad.”

READ MORE: Liam Payne’s devastating final social media post

Richard Wilkins interviewing One Direction.

Wilkins first met the One Direction star in 2012, when Payne and his bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson, and Zayn Malik were still at the start of their careers.

Looking back, he remembers Payne best as the “glue” of the group.

“Liam, you know, he was a lovely, gentle, beautiful soul. From what I observed, he was kind of the normal one, the regular guy in the group,” Wilkins says.

“Liam, to me, always seemed like the regular one who was, in many ways, the glue in the group … they were just all lovely young blokes who were living the dream.”

Wilkins interviewed One Direction many times as they shot to international fame, jetting around the world to chat with the five young men everyone on the planet seemed to be obsessed with in hotel rooms and sold-out arenas.

But this level of fame comes at a cost and the isolation and pressure of being an international superstar can be difficult for any new artist to deal with, let alone a group of young men plucked from obscurity and dropped onto the world stage before they’d even hit 20.

One Direction stars Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne.

Wilkins recalls the hotels surrounded by thousands of screaming fans, entire levels locked down and packed with security staff just to keep Payne and his bandmates safe.

“They couldn’t go out for a beer after the show. They couldn’t associate with regular people or go for a walk down the street,” Wilkins says.

“They were locked into their cocoon, literally. There was security on the floor, security around the building, security on the lifts, security outside all the rooms. All they had was each other, really.”

READ MORE: Stars pay tribute to One Direction star Liam Payne

For five years, Payne and his bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson, and Zayn Malik were the biggest artists on the planet.

In 2015, Malik announced he was leaving and the band went on an indefinite hiatus in January 2016. Payne, like his former co-stars, launched a solo career.

Liam Payne

He also welcomed a son, Bear, with Cheryl Cole in 2017. The couple later split, but Payne maintained a strong relationship with Bear.

Fans always hoped he would one day reunite with Styles, Horan, Tomlinson and Malik and perform as One Direction one last time.

Until today, Wilkins quietly hoped it just might happen.

“I always thought they may reunite for a charity event or something, but obviously that’s not going to happen now,” he says.

“There was so much love for them, collectively and individually … and those beautiful songs, beautiful records of theirs, will sound a little more poignant from this day on.”

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