Alma Cogan

Two years into her career as a pop singer, and already becoming a fixture in the spontaneous world of cabaret, Alma Cogan giggled during a recording session; a light-bulb went off in a producer's head and it became the coo-ish singer's signature, and the centerpiece of the 1954 novelty hit, her first, "Bell Bottom Blues." During the 1950s, no female singer scored as many chart entries as Cogan. She cooled off in the 1960s, but continued to write (under the pseudonym Al Western). In 1966, Cogan, just 34, succumbed to a battle with cancer.