Billion watch Jackson send-off on TV

Los Angeles gave Michael Jackson his send-off yesterday - part gospel service, part showbiz spectacle, part grieving family occasion made horribly public. Put together in double-quick time, the Staples Center memorial service featured songs, speeches, memories and tributes, with Jackson's golden coffin, surrounded by flowers, taking centre stage.

Sixteen American TV networks carried the memorial live. In Britain BBC2 cleared its schedule to show the service in its entirety, and around the world it is estimated to have been watched by one billion TV viewers. These were the high points:

♦ Best female performance: Mariah Carey was a hard act to follow after opening proceedings with a typically Carey-esque version of the famous Jackson 5 number I'll Be There in a duet with Trey Lorenz. If she was pipped by anyone, it was the heavily pregnant Jennifer Hudson with a gospel version of Will You Be There, from Jackson's Dangerous album.

♦ Best male performance: Stevie Wonder serenading Jackson's coffin with the song Never Dreamed You'd Leave In Summer was unbeatable. "This is a moment that I wish I didn't live to see coming," said Wonder. A surprise hit of the night was Jermaine Jackson's stirring rendition of Smile, from the Charlie Chaplin film Modern Times, which the actress Brooke Shields explained was the pop star's favourite song.

♦ Biggest standing ovation: The Rev Al Sharpton turned on the rhetoric - "He outsang the cynics, he outdanced his doubters, he outperformed the pessimists" - and claimed Jackson as a trail-blazer for African Americans. The big ovation came when he addressed the pop star's family, seated in the front row. "I want his children to know there was nothing strange about your daddy," he said, "it was strange what your daddy had to deal with".

♦ Best showbiz memories: Berry Gordy Jr, the founder of Motown Records and the man who first signed the Jackson 5, shared his memories and his admiration for Jackson's stagecraft. He finished his tribute by saying, to cheers from the auditorium: "The more I talk about Michael Jackson, the more I feel the King of Pop is not big enough for him. I think he is simply the greatest entertainer that ever lived."

♦ Best costumes: Michael's brothers sat in the front row, each wearing a black suit, black shades, yellow tie and a single silver glove. They smiled only once - when basketball giant Magic Johnson, who used to play for the Lakers at Staples Center, recalled an evening spent eating a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken with Michael.

♦ Most touching moment: Right at the end, Jackson's 11-year-old daughter Paris asked to speak. One of her uncles lowered the microphone and, cutting through the all media gossip and innuendo of the 12 days since Jackson's death, she said, breaking into tears: "I just wanted to say, ever since I was born, daddy has been the best father you could ever imagine. I just wanted to say I love him so much."