Family Fortunes a large electronic board, known as "Mr. Babbage", which famously sounds a wrong answer "Eh-uhh" sound effect and its accompanying X to signal the strike, as well as a "ding" (for a right answer). "Family Fortunes" was first hosted by comedian Bob Monkhouse (1980–83) then by singer and entertainer Max Bygraves (1983–85). After being rested for the whole of 1986, the show returned on 27 June 1987 with Les Dennis as presenter, and had a consistently successful run for the next 15 years. It was then moved out of peak time and became a daily daytime show hosted by Andy
Bob Monkhouse palsy, died in Braintree, Essex, in 1992, aged 40; Monkhouse was an avid campaigner for the disabled. His other son Simon, a stand-up poet, from whom he had been estranged for 13 years, died aged 46 from a heroin overdose in a hotel in northern Thailand in April 2001. Monkhouse lived in a house called "Claridges" in Eggington, near Leighton Buzzard, and had a flat in London and a holiday home in Barbados. In his autobiography, he admitted to hundreds of sexual liaisons and affairs, including one with a transsexual, but claimed that he only undertook this course of action