A GREAT grandma died after being knocked off her stool during a fight in her local.

And today the daughter of 70-year-old Margaret Bell said her family were disappointed that they had received no apology from the person who caused the fall.

Mother-of-seven Mrs Bell, of Olive Lane, Darwen, was having a drink at The Brookside Hotel, Duckworth Street, when she became innocently caught up in an argument.

The pensioner, who had been going into the pub for 25 years, was knocked off the stool where she sat each week and was taken to hospital with a broken arm.

During the following month, her family said her health seriously deteriorated because of her lack of mobility and she contracted bronchopneumonia.

At an inquest into her death the fall was highlighted as a contributory factor in her death.

Today it was revealed that pub regulars had collected money for a plaque in her memory on the bar.

Mrs Bell's daughter Christine Bell, 37, of Summerton Walk, paid tribute to "the best mum" and said it was sad to see her age 10 years in the month after her fall, just before 5pm on Saturday May 28.

She said: "She only went out once a week on a Sunday but that week she went out on a Saturday.

"My mum deteriorated so much after her fall you wouldn't have thought it was the same person. She was in pain and seemed to lose confidence. She hardly did anything.

"She had just come back from Bulgaria and was planning to take some of the kids away to Tenerife. Afterwards she couldn't even get off the chair.

"The person who knocked her off has never come to find me and apologise, which I would have expected.

"Whether we will get an apology now that it's been officially recorded as contributing to her death I don't know."

Mrs Bell, who had seven children, 25 grandchildren and 15 great grandchildren, was described by her daughter as a family woman who was "very popular and always helpful."

Christine said: "She had been going in the Brookside for about 25 years and she was well-known in Darwen.

"Hundreds of people came to her funeral."

Mrs Bell and five of her children moved to Darwen from Scotland around 30 years ago.

She had previously worked as a potato picker and worked as a weaver in India Mill, Darwen.

The landlady of the Brookside, Lila Fitzpatrick, organised a collection to put a brass plaque featuring the words "In Memory of Margaret Bell, 1935 - 2005" on the bar.

Lila, 38, said: "We wanted to have something permanent to remember Margaret by so the plaque is now on the edge of the bar where she always used to sit.

"She had been perfectly healthy before and a bubbly person. She always ordered a white wine and soda."

The medical cause of death was given as bronchopneumonia due to a heart condition aggravated by a long standing chest disease, with the fractured arm a contributory factor.

Consultant anaethetist Dr Stephen Mosedale said at the inquest that the pain of the fractured arm would have caused increased immobility which would have contributed to Mrs Bell's developing pneumonia.

Coroner Michael Singleton recorded a commentary verdict which said Mrs Baird-Bell had pre-existing illness which deteriorated as a result of the fall and eventually brought about her death.