She has been a fixture of British entertainment for more than 25 years, but Jane McDonald – who lost partner Ed in 2021 – has had a rollercoaster love life during her time in the spotlight.
The 61-year-old singer has been married – and divorced – twice and seemed to finally find her happy ending with fiancé Eddie Roth.
But Eddie sadly died in March 2021 after a battle with lung cancer. Jane first met Eddie in 1980 when he was part of the band Liquid Gold. He played a gig at a pub in West Yorkshire where Jane was working and took a liking to her.
Speaking to The Mirror in 2012, she said: “He was a gorgeous pop star and I was a naïve teenager from Yorkshire. But we went out for about 18 months. One day, I just got in my car and left. We never finished, never fell out. I drove away never expecting to see him again.”
Marriages to Paul and Henrik
In 1986, Jane married a man name Paul, but not much is know about their time together. They split one year later.
Jane’s next defining relationship came in 1998, which came during her first showbiz job, working on BBC’s The Cruise.
It was then that Jane met Henrik Brixen, who was working as a plumbing engineer on the boat.
The pair married later that year, with their relationship being detailed on a special episode named The Cruise: Jane Ties the Knot.
Henrik became Jane’s manager, but they split in 2003 with him leaving in order to “save Jane’s career”.
She told The Mirror in 2018: “We’d come to a point where Henrik had made quite a few enemies and he said: ‘If I don’t leave you, you are never going to have a career.'”
In her 2019 autobiography, Riding the Waves, Jane wrote: “Henrik and I once talked about having children but there wasn’t room for babies in his plans for me. I began to feel lonely in my marriage.”
Second time lucky for Jane McDonald with partner Eddie
It was in May 2008 when Jane met Eddie again by chance.
She was working on Loose Women when Eddie, now a drummer for The Searchers, made an appearance on This Morning.
“It felt right but it was difficult to find time with each other – The Searchers had 250 dates a year and I was doing 100 concerts. But we didn’t want to miss out again, so Eddie quit the group,” she said.
“My life has been a lot of being in the right place at the right time, so being back with Eddie has something of destiny about it.”
The pair got engaged on Christmas Eve in 2008, with Jane saying her time with Eddie was the only time she knew “real love”.
Eddie sadly passed away on 26 March 2021 at the age of 67.
Discussing her grief, Jane said during an appearance on Loose Women: “It is the support and the network that I have around me that has helped me through.
“I couldn’t have done it without the people around me.”
As fans of the singer will know, Jane lives with her best friend Sue. Sue, who appeared on Celebrity Gogglebox with Jane, moved into the star’s Wakefield home after Eddie’s death.
Cruising with Jane McDonald airs today (Sunday July 29) at 5.05pm on Channel 5 and My5.
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