Martyn Hett: Twitter flows with love for Manchester victim

Martyn Hett was not someone who lived his life in the shadows. A self-described Coronation Street “superfan”, the 29-year-old from Stockport enjoyed sharing his enthusiasm, appearing on ITV1’s Good Morning Britain to celebrate his “unashamedly unclassy” favourite character, Deirdre Barlow.

He had a tattoo of her name on his ankle but, feeling it didn’t quite go far enough, made an appearance on E4’s Tattoo Fixers to have it replaced with an alarmingly accurate portrayal of Barlow’s face while she was in prison. He then appeared on the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire programme and Radio Five Live to explain his decision. “I just love how common she is,” Hett said. “A bit like me.”

And so it was perhaps unsurprising, his devastated partner, Russell Hayward, tweeted on Wednesday, that when Hett died, “he left the world exactly as he lived, [as the] centre of attention”.

Hayward confirmed on Wednesday that “wonderful, iconic, beautiful” Hett was among those murdered at Manchester Arena. “I’m in a really bad way, so please forgive if I don’t reply. Thankfully I have his wonderful family and amazing friends to keep each other strong. I love you Martyn. I always will. x”

Tweeting a picture of the pair together, he wrote: “Soulmate doesn’t even come close. Come back to us Martyn so we can watch last night’s Corrie together.”

The heartbroken tributes followed, in Hett’s case painting a picture of an unusually charismatic and vibrant young man who lived his life in “all the colours of the rainbow”.

“Martyn loved life, he celebrated it every day and packed it to the brim with his passions,” his employer, the PR company Rumpus, said. “He taught us so much about seizing opportunities and rejoicing in everything life could offer, no matter how small.”

Hett’s friend Christina wrote that her heart was “broken into a million pieces” at the loss of “my best friend, my maid of honour”. “How am I supposed to carry on without you? Every day I am reminded of you. Now every time a celebrity dies, every time I hear the Coronation St theme ... I will think of you.”

The Radio 1 DJ Nick Grimshaw, one of thousands who followed Hett on Twitter, said he was “really very sad” to hear he had been one of those killed. “We were only talking about how funny he is just the other day in the studio. He made me laugh every day with his hilariously witty tweets. What a character. He made a lot of people smile. Wanted to send lots of love and energy to his family and friends in Manchester.”

Hett had a website where he posted clips of his articles for Attitude magazine and the Manchester Evening News, and his TV appearances – he and Hayward also won an episode of couples’ Come Dine With Me in 2014. His passions were clear: Corrie, Mariah Carey, the Spice Girls. “I like to write about strong women and low culture,” he wrote. “I also like to make silly videos with low production values.”

Hett’s entertaining Twitter feed had caught the eye of the media several times in the past, most notably when, according to Buzzfeed’s report at the time, he “saved his mum’s knitting career” in a series of tweets last November. (“Get your tissues ready: It’s time for an emotional rollercoaster.”)

His mum, Figen, he wrote on his feed, had told him she was having a bad day because she had taken a stall at a craft fair and no one had bought any of her knitted creations.

Shortly after Hett’s first message, a friend got in contact to say he wanted to buy “an adorable lilac glove monster” for £2. Three knitted hearts followed, then nine items sold in an hour; soon someone tweeted from America to ask if she shipped (“She’s going global!” tweeted Hett). Days later he met up with her, to find she had had to stock up on extra materials to cope with demand.

“She’s had loads of messages from people just telling her how nice her stuff is, which was nice for her because I think the craft fair had knocked her confidence a bit,” Hett told Buzzfeed. A counsellor, Figen had knitted for therapeutic reasons, and advised her clients to do the same.

As the story was shared widely on social media on Wednesday, the name Martyn Hett began trending worldwide on Twitter. Hett’s brother Dan wrote on his own feed that the family was “heartbroken”, then shared a screengrab of the trending column, showing his brother’s name alongside Buckingham Palace, the new Spider-Man movie and the pope. “He would, I think it’s safe to say, be fucking loving this,” he wrote.