IT IS REPORTED this morning that actor Mick Lally, best known for his role as Miley Byrne in the RTÉ soap Glenroe, has died.

Lally, 64, died in hospital this morning after a short stay, according to RTÉ.

The much-loved actor, from Tournakeady in County Mayo, was a graduate of University College Galway and was a trained teacher before exchanging the classroom for the theatre.

Lally had made his TV debut in Bracken before becoming a mainstay of the Wicklow-based farm soap opera, and formed one of Ireland’s most loved and enduring on-screen partnerships with Mary McEvoy, as his Glenroe wife Biddy, during the show’s 18-year run on RTÉ television which ended in 2001 – despite even having a memorable an on-screen affair with her sister Fidelma.

His stint in Glenroe even saw him hit the Irish singles chart in 1990, with his spinoff song ‘The By-Road to Glenroe’.

The pair reunited in recent years to appearing in John B Keane’s The Matchmaker, at the Tivoli Theatre in Dublin. Lally, who was fully bilingual, had returned to television on TG4′s Ros na Rún in 2008.

He had also appeared in the BBC television drama Ballykissangel and had provided voiceover work for the Oscar-nominated animated film The Secret of Kells.

Lally had worked right up to his death, appearing in a production of The Matchmaker – this time, ironically, alongside Geraldine Plunkett who had played Mary, his on-screen mother-in-law in Glenroe – in Cork just two weeks ago.

He is survived by his wife, Peggy, and three children.