The top joint of his left index finger was missing. He would not say how it happened - his biography suggested several theories such as
getting his finger caught in a car door or an accident on a building site. On-screen he offered many fanciful explanations such as that it was bitten off by his brother, or that it had worn away after he had used it so many times to brush dust off his jacket during his "sit-down" comedy monologues. The truth came out after his death: as a child he had been playing in an abandoned mill, he put his finger in some gears, and another child turned the gears and accidentally crushed his finger.
