There was one introduction Lauren Newton would eventually have every reason to remember — and it happened long before she and Matt Welsh became parents to six children.

At the time, Lauren was living in Japan and had no idea that a short visit home to see her parents would lead to one of the most important relationships of her life.

Behind that introduction was her father, Australian television icon Bert Newton.

A visit home that quietly changed everything

In 2003, Lauren was living in Japan when she returned to Melbourne for just a few days to visit Bert and her mother, Patti.

Her parents were appearing at the Regent Theatre in The Wizard of Oz, and Lauren went along to see them.

It was during that visit that Bert and Patti had an idea.

They already knew Matt Welsh, the Australian swimmer who had appeared as a guest on Good Morning Australia. According to Lauren, her parents had taken a liking to him — enough to suggest that their daughter should meet him.

It was a small suggestion at the time.

Neither Lauren nor Matt could have known what it would eventually become.

Bert had already taken a liking to Matt

Lauren later recalled that her parents particularly liked Matt when he appeared on Good Morning Australia.

So Bert and Patti arranged for Lauren and Matt to meet before the show.

There was no elaborate setup and, as Lauren remembered it, no great pressure attached to the introduction.

But then came the moment that changed the course of the evening.

Afterwards, Lauren and Matt were asked whether they were going somewhere for a drink.

They weren’t.

But, as Lauren recalled, they decided perhaps they should.

And that was essentially how their story began.

“Dad played Cupid”

Years later, Lauren described her father’s role with a simple phrase: Bert had played Cupid.

It was a fitting description for a man who had spent much of his life bringing warmth and laughter to Australian television — and who, in this quieter moment, had unknowingly helped bring his own daughter together with the man who would become her husband.

Lauren has said she was grateful that the meeting happened in such an uncomplicated way.

Because she had always been extremely close to her parents, she knew that whoever she married would need to be comfortable with that closeness.

Matt, she said, was.

He loved being around Bert and Patti and was happy to be part of their family.

From one introduction to a family of six

Lauren and Matt eventually married in 2006.

Their family would grow over the years, with six children — Sam, Eva, Lola, Monty, Perla and Alby.

Matt, a former Olympic swimmer, had competed for Australia at the 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games and won three Olympic medals at Sydney 2000.

But beyond the sporting achievements and the famous family name, the relationship became something much more ordinary and meaningful: a family life built over many years.

And Bert was there to see much of it unfold.

Bert became a grandfather at the centre of their family

For Lauren, her father’s relationship with her children became one of the most precious parts of their family story.

Bert had a different bond with each grandchild.

Lauren recalled how he would applaud Lola’s little performances because she loved entertaining, while with Monty, he would even watch children’s television on his own so he could understand what his grandson was interested in.

It was a glimpse of Bert away from the television cameras — not the famous entertainer Australia knew, but a grandfather deeply involved in the small details of his grandchildren’s lives.

By the time Bert died in October 2021, he had become grandfather to all six of Lauren and Matt’s children.

And then the story became something Lauren could only look back on

Bert’s death changed the family in ways Lauren knew could never really be undone.

At his state funeral, she spoke about the extraordinary place he had held not only in her life, but in the lives of her children.

“Family always came first for Dad,” Lauren said in a letter read at the service. She described him as the greatest father she could have wished for and said he had been a huge part of her children’s lives.

That makes the story of Lauren and Matt’s first meeting feel different with hindsight.

It wasn’t simply a famous father introducing his daughter to someone he thought she might like.

It was a small moment that eventually became a marriage, six children and a family life that Bert himself would become an important part of.

The introduction that became a lifetime

There is something quietly moving about Lauren’s recollection.

She had simply flown home from Japan to see her parents.

Bert and Patti happened to like a young swimmer they had met through television.

They suggested their daughter meet him.

Lauren and Matt agreed to have a drink.

And from that seemingly ordinary decision came a relationship that would last for decades and a family that grew far beyond anything Bert could have known that evening.

Years later, the story carries an extra layer of meaning.

Because when Lauren looks back at the beginning of her life with Matt, there is one person who was there at the very start — the father she would later describe as someone who had played Cupid for her.

And perhaps that is one of the quieter parts of Bert Newton’s legacy: not something that happened on a television stage, but something that continued through the family he helped bring together.