Caroline Aherne, the BAFTA winning comedy writer and actress, has revealed she is fighting lung cancer.

The star of The Royle Family and creator of the character Mrs Merton is undergoing treatment in Manchester.

Aherne revealed the news as she prepares to help launch the Macmillan Cancer Improvement Partnership, a £3.4m scheme which will bring together cancer care providers and patients to better support those affected by the disease.

She is now urging other cancer patients to tell the partnership what improvements can be made in treatment and care in the city.

Alongside her brother Patrick, she was born with a rare cancer of the retina. It was fully treated, but she was left almost blind in one eye. She has also been treated for bladder cancer in the past.

Talking to the Manchester Evening News, she said: "I've had cancer and my brother's had cancer and we know how it affects people.

"We're lucky in Manchester to have some of the best bits of cancer care with places like The Christie, the Nightingale Centre and the Cecelia Centre at Wythenshawe Hospital and St Ann's Hopice - and the last thing I want to do is knock the fantastic work that goes on in this city.

"It's brilliant that all these big institutions want to make cancer care better for Manchester people, but even the best doctors, nurses and managers on Earth aren't going to be able to understand what needs improving unless people affected by cancer in Manchester get involved and tell them what needs to change.

"The reason why the partnership has been formed is because all the partners recognise that the whole cancer care system is fragmented, meaning that people do fall through the cracks.

"They've asked me to get involved and I'm really glad that I can do my bit to encourage Manchester people to speak up about where things do go wrong with cancer care.

"It's truly shocking to learn that Manchester came bottom out of 150 areas in England for premature deaths from cancer. Our survival rates are a quarter lower than average and the number of people getting lung cancer is a third higher here than in the rest of England. There are too many stories about bad communication leading to patients waiting too long and feeling ignored and abandoned and that same bad communication is contributing to poor statistics on cancer.

"The partnership needs people like us to start explaining to all the institutions what needs changing so that these big, complex organisations can get together to make the improvements."

Nicola Cook from Macmillan Cancer Support comments: "We're delighted that Caroline is supporting the partnership. We know that its success hinges on the involvement of people affected by cancer in Manchester. Caroline's one of Manchester's own. She's loved here and people identify with her. We hope that if people see that Caroline is sitting down and talking to us then maybe they'll know that they can too."

Aherne's brother Patrick told Macmillan Cancer Research that Caroline's lung cancer diagnosis had been made late in 2013, and that "the form of lung cancer that she is suffering from is genetic and linked to the retinoblastoma she had as a baby".

A former smoker, her previous bladder cancer is also said to have been genetic and related to the retinoblastoma.

Aherne has continued with TV work during this period. She has narrated Gogglebox, and provided her voice to animated CBBC comedy Strange Hill High.

She'll next been seen on TV in The Fast Show Special, a TV broadcast of some of the sketches filmed by The Fast Show team for the online series published in 2011.

In the below episode she appears as school girl Janine Carr, who talks about Facebook: