I am not for a moment suggesting that I came to know him well, because I didn't.

However, through my friendship with Uri Geller, I was able to observe the King of Pop at very close quarters, having the opportunity to chat to him one-to-one on several occasions.

I do not believe that many people could actually get too close to Jackson. It was not in his nature to permit it. Even his closest acquaintances were kept at arm's length.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach probably came nearer than most to understanding Jackson and getting inside his mind.

The apparently odd relationship between Jacko and Geller (pictured above) was not quite as odd as it seemed.

There was a meeting of minds. The pop star, like the paranormalist was a deeply spiritual man.

It was his sensitivity and gentleness that appealed to Geller - two traits with which he readily identified.

Geller was so cynically condemned by the media for choosing Jackson as his best man when he decided to renew his wedding vows under a chuppah just over eight years ago.

He was accused of milking the occasion for all the publicity he could garner - otherwise why elevate Jackson to such a role when he had known him for a matter of just a few years?

How wrong the media were. I was there and I witnessed for myself the deep bond that the two had developed. Jackson had spent considerable periods with Geller and his family and the troubled artiste had, it seemed, found a soulmate in Uri.

Jacko, in typical style, arrived at the chuppah two hours late, his leg encased in a cast. Who knows whether it was broken or not. With the King of Pop you never really could tell what was for effect and what was genuine.

But there were times during the ceremony when Jackson's eyes lit up and he beamed broadly.

He seemed very much at home with the Geller family who treated him as one of their own.

It must have been desperately hurtful for Uri to be accused so wrongly by some sections of the media of capitalising on his death and having broken all contact with him years earlier.

How wrong they were again. I know because it was I who broke the news of Jackson's death to Uri last Thursday evening and his reaction was of pure shock - not a case of crocodile tears but of genuine distress at the untimely end his friend had met.

Yes, there was a mutual rift following the infamous Martin Bashir television interview with Jackson which Geller helped broker.

But a friendship like theirs would never disappear and the two remained in contact, despite what the media are now alleging. Jackson was a deeply troubled individual. He had deep flaws in his character and his personality.

Those who witnessed his performance at the Oxford Union the day before the Geller chuppah, with Jackson flanked on stage by Uri and Boteach, had no doubt that there was more to him than pop music and dancing.

He displayed an intellect and articulacy of which those who knew him were well aware, but which took by surprise many of the students present that night who tried to floor him with their questions.

Jackson's tears that evening were the result of the raw emotion that was exposed as he recalled his desperately unhappy childhood - or lack of it.

As he collapsed tearfully into the arms of Geller and Boteach, needing fully five minutes to recover his composure, the real, naked Michael Jackson and all his demons were there for all to see.

In the rabbi and the paranormalist, next to Elizabeth Taylor, he had probably found the only two true friends he ever knew.