Ray Galton, one half of a hugely influential writing team with Alan Simpson that was regularly voted the funniest in sitcom history, has died this weekend at the age of 88. The scriptwriter died peacefully on Friday night after a “long and heartbreaking battle with dementia”, his family said.

Galton worked throughout his 60-year career with Simpson, who died in February last year, aged 87. Most famously, they created Hancock’s Half Hour, the radio and television comedy that established Tony Hancock as the quintessential disappointed British antihero of the postwar years.

The success of the Hancock show, which ran from 1954 to 1961, first on radio and later on television, led to them regularly being hailed as the creators of British situation comedy.

The duo also went on to create Steptoe and Son, the squabbling father-and-son rag-and-bone men. The show, starring Harry H Corbett and Wilfrid Brambell, ran for eight series until 1974. At its peak, it commanded an audience of 28 million.

Voices from across television entertainment spoke of the brilliance of Galton’s writing this weekend. David Walliams tweeted: “What an incredible body of work Ray Galton has left us with. Some of the greatest TV comedy ever written, ‘Hancock’ & ‘Steptoe & Son’ are still the gold standard of sitcoms. Matt & I got to spend time with him & Alan Simpson. I was in complete & utter awe.”

Tessa Le Bars, Galton’s manager, said: “I have had the great honour of working with Ray for over 50 years and for the last 40 as his manager and friend. With his lifelong co-writer, the late Alan Simpson, they were regarded as the fathers and creators of British sitcom.”

Galton was part of the team who created Hancock’s Half Hour

Photograph: BBC

Receiving the entertainment industry’s most prestigious award, a Bafta fellowship, in 2016, Galton’s speech made reference to several of their greatest triumphs, including the most famous episodes of Hancock’s Half Hour, The Radio Ham and The Blood Donor: “We are happy and honoured to accept this award on behalf of all the blood donors, test pilots, radio hams and rag-and-bone men of the 20th century without whom we would probably be out of a job,” he said.

The writers met while both being treated for tuberculosis at the same Surrey sanatorium in 1949. Galton and Simpson wrote to Frank Muir and Denis Norden, the leading comedy writers of the day, and were invited to the BBC’s Broadcasting House in London for a “chat”. They went on to write for numerous stars including Frankie Howerd and Les Dawson.

But their most important creative moment came when they were still in their 20s. On 2 November, 1954, the 30-year-old Hancock stood behind a radio microphone for the debut episode of their new show, his first starring vehicle for BBC radio.

Seven years later, Hancock was the most famous performer in Britain, winning 20 million listeners. The alter-ego he played, Anthony Aloysius St John Hancock, resident of 23 Railway Cuttings, East Cheam,was a version of himself, but dressed like an old-fashioned dandy with delusions of grandeur. The show was first broadcast on BBC radio from 1954 to 1959 and also moved to BBC TV from 1956. Its regular performers included Sid James, Hattie Jacques and Kenneth Williams.

Speaking in 1997 before the launch of a new sitcom about his time as a youth in a sanatorium, Galton said: “Finding the plots used to be a lot easier for me than the writing. Nowadays, I find the ideas much more difficult. Practically everything has been done.”