With I Love Lucy (1951-1957), she and her then Cuban husband, Desi Arnaz pioneered the three-camera technique now the standard in filming TV sitcoms, and the concept of syndicating TV programmes. She was also the first woman to own her own film studio as the head of Desilu, their company. I Love Lucy also ranked as a very early television sitcom (although the format had existed for decades in radio, and in fact other TV sitcoms predated her show), and was among the first stars to film before a live audience.

From a production aspect, the use of actual film, as opposed to the inferior-quality kinescope of other TV shows of the time, made the show far more visually appealing.

Lucille's other TV shows were The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour (1957-1960),The Lucy Show (1962-1968), The Danny Kaye Show with Lucille Ball (1962), Mr and Mrs (1964)

Lucy in London (1966), CBS Salutes Lucy: The First 25 Years (1976) and. Stone Pillow (1985).

Lucy had a turbulent childhood. Her father died before she was four, and her mother worked several jobs. So, she and her younger brother were raised by their grandparents. Always willing to take responsibility for her brother and young cousins, she was a restless teenager who yearned to "make some noise". She entered a drama school in New York, but while her classmate Bette Davis received all the raves, she was sent home with the words, "too shy." She found some work modeling for Hattie Carnegie's, and in 1933 was chosen to be a Goldwyn Girl and appear in the film Roman Scandals (1933).

Then followed several small roles, including one in Top Hat (1935). Eventually, she received starring roles in B-pictures, and occasionally a good role in an A-picture, such as Stage Door (1937) or The Big Street (1942). While filming Too Many Girls (1940), she met and fell head over heels in love with actor-musician Desi Arnaz. Lucy soon switched to MGM, where she got better roles in films such as Du Barry Was a Lady (1943), Best Foot Forward (1943), the Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy film, vehicle Without Love (1945).

In 1948, she took a central role in the radio comedy My Favorite Husband, in which she played the scatterbrained wife of a Midwestern banker. In 1950, CBS came knocking with the offer of turning it into a TV series. After convincing the top brass to let Desi play her husband and to sign over the rights to and creative control over the series to them, work began on the most popular and universally beloved sitcom of all time--I Love Lucy.

Lucille died in 1989, of a ruptured aorta at the age of 77 and was cremated. Her remains were initially interred in the Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles, California, but were later moved by her children, Desi Arnaz, Jr and Lucie Arnaz to the Lake View Cemetery, in Jamestown, New York.

Compiled by Cultural Correspondent