There is something extraordinary going on here. It was really after she died that it started. Texting. Everybody. People who never knew Katy French, people who thought they didn't like Katy French. All finding themselves shocked. All shocked that they are shocked. You could imagine that it is because of the manner of her death, that it ties in with the country's current obsession with cocaine. You could say that it is because it is such a terrible, cruel, pointless tragedy. You could say it is because the country, to some extent, has been obsessed with Katy French for the last year. She had got under everyone's skin to some extent. Love her or hate her, practically everybody in the country seemed to feel they had a stake in Katy.

I think there's one very simple reason why Katy French's death has had such an extraordinary impact and led to such an extraordinary outpouring of grief. That is because Katy French was a superstar. Katy French was a better banker than Bono to sell papers in this country. She had the looks, the sass, the magnetism, the charisma, the brains, the performing nous; all of that. Katy had the indefinable quality that made people want to watch her. And of course, poor Katy had that thing that really makes a superstar; that slight wanting, that slight vulnerability. And maybe that slight wanting was the poor pet's undoing in the end.

It's curious the things you remember. I first met Katy French properly at the beginning of what would become the year of the French. I'd seen her around obviously and I'd seen her pictures. But nothing really prepared you for the ball of determination and composure that came into the office that day. That was the first time I got to study her properly. And, funny, the first thing that struck me was that, aesthetically, her nose was perfect. And she had a lovely voice. I told her that much later. She said it was one of the nicest things anyone ever said to her.

I guess I was there or thereabouts for this past year, the year in which she burnt so brightly. And I dunno, we kind of got each other, me and Katy. I don't get that many people, and many people don't get me. So it's nice to find someone new who does. And this past year we kind of became confidantes, pals, whatever. The child in her spoke to the child in me and the cynic in her spoke to the cynic in me.

The obvious stuff first. If you didn't know Katy French you might be surprised to hear that the overwhelming things, the first things that spring to mind, when I think about her are her intelligence and her generosity. I was suspicious of her for the first few months I knew her. I didn't entirely trust her. Because that's what you'd expect from an opportunist, careerist modelly type isn't it?

But I learned very quickly that I was underestimating her. I guess everyone had their own experience of Katy and I think she was quite good at keeping the various people she knew in different compartments. But for me, Katy French was one of the sweetest, kindest, most generous people I ever met. She was a giver, a fixer. I think she got her buzz out of giving and helping. The other thing about her was how calm she was. I'm a bit hyper and I get cranky easily. In matters of work, or in matters of trying to discourage her from doing things that I didn't think she should do, I would sometimes get impatient. And she handled it as sweetly as anyone could. Unflappable.

But she wasn't so unflappable underneath it all.

She told me the Friday before that fateful Saturday that she had thrived on this year. And there's no doubt she did. When I met Katy first, at the start of 2007, she was seeking to end a relationship that wasn't good, she didn't have a lot of money and she was just another Irish Model. The last time I spoke to her things were very different. She was a national icon now, with a few quid, a relationship for which she had hope, and with a few TV projects on the boil. 2008 was going to be a big year for her. As more than one TV producer has said to me in the last few days, Katy French was going to be a superstar. That Friday she was tough and confident.

But she wasn't so tough. Again, other people might dispute this and I can only go by what I know. But I think Katy was just a baby underneath it all. The thing I always thought most about her was that she just wanted someone to look after her and for her to have someone to look after. I think Katy was a really genuinely lovely, decent, kind, person who was bursting with love. She gave it to the charities she did so much work for; to her family and friends, and of course, to the men in her lives, for whom she gave up everything.

A lot of really seedy horrible things have been implied about Katy's life in the last week. I'm holding on to what might be a somewhat innocent version of her but I think it's as true as any version of her.

I called out to her on that Friday to do an interview with her at the house in Citywest. I actually suggested a glass of wine but she had no booze in the house. Instead she insisted on spaghetti and tea and biscuits. I was hungover from her party the night before and straight away she kicked into looking-after mode, the practical Mom.

She looked so sweet and innocent sitting there on the couch opposite me in her tweedy city shorts slurping down her spaghetti, like a happy little kid. I've stopped reading the papers or listening to the radio or watching TV at this stage. I don't need to know any more. Maybe it's being naïve, but I want to remember her like that.

I want to remember that afternoon sitting with this incredible contradiction, who gave interviews like a pro but who was happy sitting there with a bowl of pasta on her knees, an innocent, a home bird, someone who wouldn't really have been out partying anymore if she had had a home and family to look after, or something.

Then she told me her life story, dazzled me yet again with how smart and self-aware and honest she was, and then we hung out a while and talked about everything.

Then she drove me home, playing me Leonard Cohen songs. I don't think I'll ever listen to Tower of Song again without thinking of Katy a little bit. "I was born like this, I had no choice, I was born with the gift of a golden voice."

Funny, because Katy talked that day about how she wasn't really addicted to publicity and how modelling frustrated her because what she was really addicted to was having a voice.

And then: "Now I bid you farewell, I don't know when I'll be back, They're moving us tomorrow to that tower down the track, But you'll be hearing from me baby, long after I'm gone, I'll be speaking to you sweetly, From a window in the Tower of Song."

We sat in the car and chatted for a while before I went in home. I told her this kind of personal thing because it was related to a thing she was telling me. And the last thing she said to me was thanks for telling me that. And I brushed it off, the way you do after sharing something, said a casual see ya and got out of the car and walked off without looking back to wave or anything. I didn't even give her a showbizzy two pecks on the cheeks. I'm not big on goodbyes anyway. And shure, I didn't think we were saying goodbye. As you do with your friends, I thought we had all the time in the world.

I'll never forget Katy and I'll never forget my year of the French, when this big ball of dazzling light and charm, this force of nature, came into my life. It is too horrible, too tragic and too terrible how it all ended. I'll never forget either that text from a friend on Sunday morning saying "ring me urgently". I thought it was something horrible about me in the papers. I wish it had been. Instead it was the beginning of a bad dream that is still going on. Like many of you, I still don't quite believe it.

- Brendan O'Connor