I don't pretend to have known Matt Price well but, like a lot of people, he touched my life and I will always remember him.
I don't pretend to have known Matt Price well but, like a lot of people, he touched my life and I will always remember him.
I got to chat to him irregularly down at City Beach during his holidays from Canberra and, more recently, after his return to Perth.
My connection with him was distantly through family and friends and the fact that we were both in the media. A typical Perth-type link, but it was enough. He always had the time to chat and showed genuine interest in any discussion.
Matt was a funny bloke to talk to, just as he was to listen to on the radio or read in his wonderful commentaries.
Listening to the eulogies and chatting with those that knew him today, I realise this was Matt's thing - making everyone in his sphere feel comfortable, whether that was in one-on-one discussion or through his work in the media.
He had a way of using humour without being deliberately hurtful.
I was genuinely glad when he said he was returning to Perth to base himself here. Western Australia loses too many people like Matt to bigger places.
Prodigious talent so often morphs itself into celebrity that doesn't really belong here. That didn't happen with this down-to-earth Perth bloke, with his touch of the Aussie larrikin.
His funeral confirmed that. Overflowing with close friends, as well as those in the media and politics, who came to support his family, the service at St Joseph's in Subiaco celebrated his success without excess.
Even those present who could be called celebrities - Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd, his deputy Julia Gillard and treasurer Wayne Swan included - were secondary to his wider Perth circle who came to mourn a talent lost too soon.
But it wasn't just talent they celebrated. Matt had another quality that so rarely comes with the gifted. It was humility.
News Limited John Hartigan explained this better than ever in wonderful his eulogy today.
"Recently I offered him editorship of one of our newspapers," Mr Hartigan said.
"He would have been a brilliant editor, but he turned it down."
"He said he wasn't ready. His humility was unbelievable."
As readers and followers of his work we were the lucky recipients of this humility. He stuck with writing and broadcasting, and we were richer for it.
Matt leaves a mark most of us never will - not just due to his wonderful talent but because he applied his gifts where they were best suited and was never drawn away from that calling by other trappings that come with success.
