The death has been announced of I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue writer Iain Pattinson. He was 68.

His agents PBJ posted the news on social media, in the style of the long-running Radio 4 show he was intimately involved with for many years. 

"I see we’ve had a letter from a Mrs Trellis of North Wales. It is with sorrow that we announce the death of our client and friend, Iain Pattinson. We are enormously proud of him and his extraordinary career, most notably as the writer of I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue."

Pattinson was a highly skilled wordsmith and on ISIHAC was known for his "blue-chip filth" – smutty double endtendres and innuendo.

Tributes were quickly paid on Twitter. Michael Carter posted a link to a Guardian diary story by the late Simon Hoggart in which he recalled arguably the show's dirtiest-ever joke. Long-time host Humphrey Lyttelton said that the next round was based on the popular TV mime show, Give Us A Clue. "The most highly skilled of all players was Lionel Blair. But tears of frustration welled in his eyes when, during the team's Italian tour, he was not allowed the use of his mouth to finish off Two Gentlemen Of Verona."

Simon Blackwell, the writer of C4 comedy Back tweeted: "Dreadfully sad. He was a genius, in a different league to everyone else doing that kind of stuff. Those joyous monologues he wrote for Humph about where the show was from that week, and the Sound Charades intros - things of structural beauty that would make me cry with laughter."

Fellow writer Ged Parsons tweeted: "Awful news. Such a funny writer, and a lovely man. Iain and I were in the same 'generation' of BBC Light Ent. Comedy writers. Even in recent years, when we might meet only at LE Christmas drinks, we'd make time for the traditional curmudgeonly mutter in the corner. R.I.P., fella."

In a long career Pattinson also worked on shows including The Smith And Jones sketchbook, Clive Anderson Talks Back and Would I Lie To You?

Just to make obituarists' jobs easier @themacraecase linked to a compilation of Lionel Blair gags that Pattinson would have worked on.