Best known for playing the role of Mrs Slocombe on the 70’s and 80’s British sitcom “Are You Being Served?”, Mollie Sugden passed away today from a long illness at 86.

One of a select bunch of British performers to achieve national treasure status, Sugden was renowned for her portrayal of fearsome battleaxes. The first of such roles to achieve acclaim was as Mrs Hutchinson in The Liver Birds, a series so popular it was revived in the late 90s using the original cast.

She was the star of many other comedies, including Come Back Mrs Noah, That’s My Boy and My Husband And I, which she made with her husband.

But it was as the bossy sales lady Betty Slocombe in Are You Being Served? that she was best known. The long-running, innuendo-laden television comedy was such a hit that a feature film was made based on the series, and it was successfully exported to America. Every episode Sugden sported a different hair colour and continually harped on about her “pussy”.

And without further ado, Mrs. Slocombe and her famous “pussy.”

And my personal favorite… “Dear Sexy Knickers…”

More recently Sugden appeared as herself in another very popular BBC sitcom, Little Britain.

A “small” group of protesters gathered outside of the Ed Sullivan Theatre in New York on Monday, calling for the firing of David Letterman over a joke he made about Sarah Palin’s daughter last week. Watch.

Wow… Palin just brings out the crazy… ahm… I mean best, in people, doesn’t she?

Be sure to visit the blog A Conservative Lesbian. They’re on a personal crusade to get Letterman fired…

More from TMZ:

Trump told us Carrie refused to appear at around 30 events on behalf of Miss California USA. He says Prejean was contractually bound to appear and she just wouldn’t do it. He doesn’t think her attitude has anything to do with her politics.

Mr. Trump, do you think instead you were just blinded by her… Oh, I don’t know…
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Stephen Colbert who is broadcasting from Baghdad, Iraq this week broaches the controversial issue in front of a packed house of officers and soldiers. Watch:

It’s hard to read the applause and laughter of the audience. Was it because of Colbert “playing” gay or the absurdity of the policy? Or mixture of both? I did notice the lack of recognition in the audience when Lt. Dan Choi and Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, both victims of DADT were mentioned. Not even a smattering of applause. Hopefully they were simply unaware of the news back home.

It would have been interesting if they had done cutaways to the audience for their reactions during the segment… It would have been doubly interesting if Colbert had polled the audience about their position on DADT. But this is a comedy show… lest we forget.