Sir Paul McCartney reveals why he could never tell fellow Beatles legend John Lennon he loved him 

Sir Paul McCartney has revealed he ‘never got round’ to telling John Lennon that he loved him.

The Beatles legend said of the pair’s childhood friendship: ‘As 16-year-old, 17-year-old Liverpool kids, you could never say that.

‘It just wasn’t done. So I never did… just say, ‘John, love you man’. I never got round to it. Now it’s great just to realise how much I love this man.’

Describing his youth with Lennon as ‘like walking up a staircase… side by side’, the 79-year-old said: ‘I just remember how great it was to work with him and how great he was… because you are not messing around here, you are not just singing with Joe Bloggs. You are singing with John Lennon.’

He added: ‘I realised that as we were making up songs, I would suggest a line and he would suggest a line. That was very much how we did it, just ping-ponging off each other.’

The left-handed star said: ‘Because he was right-handed, for me it was like looking in a mirror. It was great, I could kind of see the chords that I was playing in the mirror.’

Sir Paul’s on-stage interview at London’s Southbank Centre, to promote his new book The Lyrics, represented his first live event in two years. 

Sir Paul’s on-stage interview at London’s Southbank Centre, to promote his new book The Lyrics, represented his first live event in two years

He added: ‘I realised that as we were making up songs, I would suggest a line and he would suggest a line. That was very much how we did it, just ping-ponging off each other’

PRI*208029118 Undated handout photo of the front cover of Paul McCartney’s new book, The Lyric

Reflecting on the band’s break-up in 1970, he said: ‘I think the biggest misconception at the end of The Beatles was that I’d broken The Beatles up. 

‘I lived with that for quite a while, saying to people, ‘No I didn’t, no I didn’t’. But once a headline is out there, it sticks.’