MICHAEL BENTINE, who died yesterday at the age of 74, made his name as one of the Goons in the mould-breaking radio comedy show which ran from 1949-60, appearing with Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe. In fact, although he was always one of the Goons, he only appeared in the first 41 episodes, many of which he helped to write. He went on to become a television star in his own right in shows such as It's a Square World on which he used to display his famous Flea Circus.

Born in Watford to a Peruvian father and an English mother, Bentine was the most intellectual of the famous four. A man of diverse talents, he wrote some 14 books, was a rocket physicist, a Shakespearian actor, and an expert on the paranormal. He was also an archer, a pilot, a yachtsman and an accomplished raconteur, which not all comedians necessarily are.

Diagnosed with prostate cancer three years ago, he was admitted to hospital last week. He had been unconscious for most of the time, but on Monday when he was visited by Prince Charles, a long time friend and fan, he awoke and the two, Bentine's son Richard said, held ``the most ridiculous funny conversation.'' Richard said the visit had been an extraordinarily kind gesture. ``It gave me back my father for an hour,'' he added.

According to Denis Main Wilson, one of the BBC producers of the Goon Show, Bentine was a superb technician with an incredible command of English. ``He was over-generous to a fault to all his friends,'' he said.

Sir George Martin, who produced the Goon's records, said: ``I never heard him speak ill of anybody. You don't find that very often in show business. He always saw the funny side of things and always saw how ludicrous people can be.'' Bentine reacted to his cancer with tremendous courage, refusing conventional treatment and insisting he would fight it with the power of laughter.

``I've got an indolent carcinoma - a lazy bugger like me,'' he said. He accepted hormone treatment, but refused chemotherapy, having watched the effect it had had on two of his daughters. Elaine, from his first marriage, died of cancer aged 41, and four years later his daughter Marylla by his second marriage died from it at the age of 35.

`` Radical surgery did nothing for my mother and very little for my two daughters,'' he said earlier this year. ``All I am trying to do is see how much one is helped by positive thinking. I want to see how long humour can help me, because it might help someone else on the way there. I've got no choice. My mother and daughters all met it in its most horrific form with humanity and humour. They kept the comedy right until the last. What alternative have you got? You've got to go that way. You can turn your toes up dead quick by being negative.''

He came from a distinguished Peruvian family. His grandfather was about to become the country's president, but died before he could take office. His father came to England and married the daughter of an official with the Southend Water Board. He was an aeronautical engineer and sufficiently rich to send Michael to Eton. In 1939, aged 17, he volunteered for the RAF, but was rejected because of his Peruvian ancestry. He took to the stage, having made 17 unsuccessful attempt to enlist, and was working at the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park for Robert Atkins when two military police arrested him for desertion. One of his bids had been successful, but the call up had gone to one of his many old addresses. He joined Bomber Command, and would regale people with a story about how a portable lavatory was accidentally dropped on Berlin by the RAF, causing the Germans to accuse Britain of using biological warfare.

he returned to the stage, and following the obligatory stint for comedians of the time at the Windmill, where he met Milligan, the Goon Show was born. After he left the series he went on to create Potty Time on BBC television, It's A Square World and the children's series The Bumblies, which ran from 1953-54.

Bentine's comedy style in the Goons and on his own inspired his successors in shows like Monty Python's Flying Circus. Michael Palin said yesterday: ``He could do marvellously inventive and strange things with objects. I was a big fan of the Goons so a lot of the work that they did has sunk in.'' Sir Harry Secombe, who is abroad, was very upset, Richard Bentine said. He and Bentine had recorded Songs of Praise two or three weeks ago and had talked about how to deal with bereavement on the programme.

Bentine was awarded the CBE in the 1959 New Year's Honours, receving notes of congratulation not only from Prince Charles, but also from the Duke of Edinburgh and Prince Michael of Kent. Because he suffered from chronic asthma he spent his winters in California, but returned each summer to his home in Tadworth, Surrey. He met his second wife, Clementina, a former ballerina, while he was appearing at the London Hippodrome. They had four children. His son Stuart was killed in an air crash in 1972. He is survived by his wife, his son Richard and his daughter Serena.