Freddie Mercury's devastating words after last ever Queen gig exposed by Brian May

No-one knew at the time that Queen's Knebworth Park show in 1986 would be the last time the group ever took to the stage together again - but instinctively, Freddie Mercury had made a telling comment about his future as a performer. He'd confided in Brian May that he was in agonising pain, little imagining that the HIV virus was incubating inside his body and that just a few years later, he would be dead.

Brian explained after his co-star's death: "Did we know [the Knebworth Park show] would be the last time? No. Freddie said something like, 'Oh. I can't f*****g do this anymore, my whole body's wracked with pain!' but he usually said things like that at the end of a tour, so I don't think we took it seriously, really." Months after that show, Freddie was diagnosed with AIDS - a death sentence in those days due to the lack of widely available modern medicine - and he chose to keep his condition a secret.

He then had a change of heart and confessed all to the world on November 23, 1991 - just a day before he died.

Freddie had never formally confirmed his sexuality in a statement, and is known to have intimate relationships with both men and women during his life, but after leaving his long-term romance with Mary Austin, he'd moved in with a man called Jim Hutton.

Mary later claimed he'd come out to her in 1976 - but no-one knew that his bouts of increasingly poor health could have been related to a sexually transmitted illness.

Freddie had enjoyed a close friendship with Princess Diana, and sources have since speculated that her eagerness to help fund HIV and AIDS research and promote awareness could have been due - at least in part - to her feelings about the demise of her rock star pal.

Diana then died herself just a few years after Freddie in a tragic car crash that was mourned the world over.

Meanwhile, earlier this year, news of Freddie's alleged "secret daughter" went public in a new book by music biographer Lesley-Ann Jones.

According to the author, she was provided for financially in a "private legal arrangement" which was not part of the rock singer's will, but wishes to remain anonymous.

She'd handed over 17 intensely personal journals to Jones, icluding a tear-jerking handwritten letter in which she described her "close and loving relationship" with Freddie - but has said she cherishes her "peaceful and anonymous life" with her husband abroad, and that "nobody needs to know who I am".