Los Angeles - On the normally sterile streets outside the UCLA Medical Centre, Michael Jackson's fans from Los Angeles and around the world gathered Friday to pay their respects to a star who remained as strange and elusive in death as he had been in life.

"No one really knew Michael - he was a unique," said Mynesha Edwards, a medical secretary. "His death was a tragedy, but the way he was treated in life was tragic too."

She was speaking at an impromptu shrine set up by fans outside the building where the man widely regarded as the greatest pop star since Elvis had died the day before.

Many fans brought candles, flowers and posters to pay their respect. Others just scribbled notes on pieces of paper. "We will never forget you," wrote Helene from Paris. "When I had faith in nothing else, I had faith in you," wrote someone else on a beautifully drawn picture of Jackson, back when he looked young and healthy, a superstar worthy of his name.

Most fans just stood there silently, pondering Jackson's life and death, wondering where everything had begun to go wrong for a man who after his shocking demise was widely acknowledged as one of the greatest geniuses in the history of modern music.

When they did manage to speak about him, they acknowledged his many bizarre facets, but insisted that their fragile hero's failings were blown out of proportion by the press and by people who tried to take advantage of him.

"So many people think of him as some sort of paedophile - but the fact is that those were all rumours and slander and lies," said Alan Jamis, a university student. "At the time even I almost believed it. But now he's dead and it's clear as day that he was a gentle soul who would never have harmed a fly. It's true what they say: The good die young."

Other visitors were busy tapping on their smartphones for the latest news about how Jackson had died. Local reports said that he had been given morphine or other strong pain killers as he struggled to prepare for a comeback tour.

"He must have been under huge stress, but he was under stress his whole life. It's obvious that the people who should have taken care of him didn't," said Laurie Bright, 42, who took the day off from her work at a hairdresser's to mourn a man she called her "life hero."

While the mood at the makeshift hospital shrine was one of sadness, there was none of the shock or crowds that had drawn the world's cameras there the night before.

"The night was crazy," said Roman, a male nurse at the hospital. "But now it's over. Michael Jackson is history."(dpa)