Max Clifford - my tricky times buying scoops from the go-to publicist

I am going to resist the opportunity to kick Max Clifford now that he is down, having been found guilty of eight charges of indecent assault.

I think I first met him in 1981 when I became assistant editor of The Sunand my memories of my dealings with him are certainly mixed.

He was, to say the least, tricky. No matter how often I (or my explosive editor, Kelvin MacKenzie) pledged not to deal with him any longer, it was impossible to do so because he came up with the goods.

By that, I mean he brokered stories and pictures that, for a variety of reasons, were considered to be guaranteed sales-winners.

Celebrities who either found themselves uncomfortably at the centre of some story, or those who simply sought publicity, inevitably found their way to Max. He was the go-to publicist.He played it both ways, concealing the truth for those paying him to cover up their indiscretions and exaggerating stories for those clients desperate to appear in the headlines. Of course Freddie Starr didn't eat a hamster.

In a relatively small red-top newspaper market, but one where secrecy was paramount, Max proved to be an adept negotiator. Even over the phone, I could sense him shrugging his shoulders as I attempted to bid him down on his latest kiss-and-tell offering.

He knew the right buttons to push: "If you don't want it, then I suppose I'll have to go to the News of the World or Sunday Mirror."

When stories didn't work out as planned - a not uncommon occurrence - one could be certain that the calmest person in the media storm would be Max himself. He had a way of extricating himself, and his clients, from tight spots.

When a young man boasted in a typical Sun "exclusive" of his sexual frolics with a then well-known soap star, her lawyers threatened legal action on the grounds that he was gay.

Max, summoned to MacKenzie's office and confronted with the legal threat, exhibited no sign of panic. After a brief conversation with his client, he simply said: "Some days he's gay, some days he's straight. This happened on straight day." I think we settled out of court.

When I left The Sun in 1986, I thought I'd seen the last of Max. But I bumped into him on various talk shows and then, in 1996, he represented a woman, Mandy Allwood, who was pregnant with octuplets and miscarried all eight.

I found myself calling Max once again to ask how and why he had become involved because Allwood claimed she had been trying to avoid publicity. As always, getting at the truth - or even an approximation of the truth - proved impossible.