Necklace on in the proposal

Elizabeth Taylor,?�Actress and?�Humanitarian
Elizabeth Taylor?�at her best was a beautiful sight to behold.?�Born in London in 1932 to American parents,?�she was gracing screens before she was ten.?�Stardom followed.?�She would?�win Best Actress Oscars: for?�Butterfield 8 and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in 1960 and 1966 respectively.?�Playing Cleopatra brought her together with Richard Burton, who she went on to marry. Twice.?�She had a passion for marriage,?�tying the knot eight times?�with?�seven different?�husbands.?�?�In the 1970s, Taylor’s health began to fail her.?�Her film-making slowed down.?�Reviewers were?�often?�scornful,?�her public disappointed. ?�Yet more than ever, movie-lovers followed her private life in the mass media.?�Despite?�sometimes venomous criticism, Taylor’s popularity rose to a new height.?�In 2000?�her regal namesake Queen Elizabeth II made her a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.?�The first actress to have commanded superstar salaries in?�film was?�now devoted to AIDS charities.?�Fundraising was her forte and she helped raise millions.?�She was the first celebrity to get involved and?�fight for HIV attention, before it became fashionable.?�She screamed for education – about sex and?�against ignorance.?� “I come before you today not as an actress but on behalf of all those living with Aids. I am the advocate of the dying child in an impoverished nation. I am the voice of the needle-user in the inner city. I am the delegate of the prostitute in the urban street. I simply ask you for help for all those who cannot speak.“?�?�Taylor recruited and worked with a vast circle of friends for the cause.?�She said it became her life and?�that while on tour promoting her perfume she would seek out patients’ hospices, where the press did not?�follow her.?�An associate said: “She works very hard to let people know that it’s not over.“?�?�She wanted to be remembered most for her work with Aids sufferers.?� Copyright © 2011 euronews