The Albany Gazette - Fans line Welsh streets as Bonnie Tyler body's returns for funeral

Best known for her powerful, haunting love song "Total Eclipse of the Heart", Tyler died in hospital in Portugal last month. She was 75.

She will be laid to rest Monday following her funeral in the nearby city of Swansea, which is set to be a celebration of her life attended by family and friends.

Thousands of people flocked onto the streets of Mumbles to watch the procession transporting her coffin back to her home, an AFP reporter saw.

The crowd burst into applause and a rendition of "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" broke out as it made its way through the coastal village on Swansea's southwestern edge.

Some threw flowers onto the hearse carrying her coffin, which was draped in the Welsh flag and accompanied by a framed photograph of the singer.

Teenager Carys Edwards, 18, was among those to turn out with her mum, calling the Welsh legend "an inspiration to everybody".

"Her music touched a lot of people, especially me," she said. "I'm quite surprised how many people came here today, but then not as well, because she was such an icon.

"When we found out she passed away, it was such a heartbreak to all of us. We cried and everything."

Edwards's mum Melanie Smith, 53, added: "Most importantly, she was a Swansea girl, and she didn't forget that."

- 'Pay our respects' -

Tyler, whose real name was Gaynor Hopkins, was born and raised in a traditional coal mining village northwest of Swansea, and divided her time between south Wales and Portugal in recent years.

With her distinctive husky voice, tousled mane of blonde hair and black eyeliner, Tyler was instantly recognisable as the queen of the 1980s power ballad.

She achieved international fame that decade with the release of her "Total Eclipse" mega-hit, which topped the charts in the United States and Britain.

Following her July 8 death, her family said she had passed away as a result of an unspecified illness that she was being treated for, prompting tributes from stars of music and film as well as other figures worldwide.

It came just months after she was treated in intensive care after being placed in an induced coma following an emergency intestinal surgery.

Michael Bone, 58, and his partner Alan Hawkins, 54, travelled from central England to Mumbles "to pay our respects".

"For me personally, it's because in my teens, her music was quite prolific. For me it was her most iconic period, in the 1980s."

(A.Johnson--TAG)