With these words Sharon Dyer's sons led the final farewells to their mum in front of hundreds of mourners at her emotional funeral service.

Bradley, 13, and Connor, 11, penned heartfelt poems, which they read to a packed Sunderland Crematorium.

Sharon, 40, touched the hearts of thousands of Echo readers with her battle against cancer, and scores of people donated money to the Buy Sharon Time campaign to pay for the life-prolonging drug Lapatinib.

Sharon, who was fighting cancer in her brain, leg, liver and spine after originally being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2004, died on Tuesday of last week.

At her funeral yesterday, Bradley said: "I write this poem just to say, I miss you each and every day. I love you mam with all my heart, and we should never be apart."

Connor said: "We all miss you very much and never stop loving you. We understand that you have to go and we know that you will be free from pain.

"We will always be fine and be good because we know you are watching us from heaven."

Family and friends paid their respects yesterday by first releasing 100 pink balloons – Sharon's favourite colour – from the family home in Fordfield Road, Ford Estate, Sunderland.

Her coffin, which had been decorated with butterfly and dragonfly stickers by daughter Gemma, was then taken in a silver Jaguar – in accordance with Sharon's request – for the humanist service at the crematorium.

About 200 people, dressed in bright colours to celebrate Sharon's life, squeezed into the chapel to say their last goodbyes.

Husband Kevin, Gemma's boyfriend Steve, nephew Marc Silver and Stagecoach colleagues Ritchie Wall, Dean Burles and Carl Smurthwaite carried the coffin into the crematorium wearing pink T-shirts supporting Macmillan Cancer Support and the Tracy Crawford Foundation, while one of Sharon's favourite songs, Janet Jackson's Together Again, was played.

Conducting the service, Margaret Wood said Sharon was a "colourful character" and a devoted mam, wife and nana, who lived life to the full with enthusiasm and humour.

She said: "She was a special, charismatic lady who was much loved and well liked by all who knew her."

She spoke of Sharon's love for her work as a bus driver at Stagecoach, where she met Kevin.

Stagecoach buses across Sunderland and South Shields pulled over to allow drivers and passengers to pay their respects with a minute's silence.

Ms Wood said Sharon's brave fight against cancer was "an inspiration to us all" and spoke of the friendships she had made with Peter McKenzie and Julie Reay through the Echo's campaign.

She added: "She appreciated the many donations to the Buy Sharon Time campaign."

Former X Factor star Charlie Mole, who had met Sharon just days before she died, sang Nina Simone's Feeling Good.

The curtains closed on the coffin to the sound of Barbra Streisand's Love Inside.

As mourners left the crematorium for the wake at the Hastings Hill, Christina Aguilera's Beautiful – a song which Kevin used to sing to Sharon – was played.

Sharon leaves Kevin, 48, children Gemma, 23, Bradley and Connor and granddaughter Codie, five.

Her ashes will be kept at the family home.