María Amelia López Soliño, a Spanish great-grandmother who described herself as the "world's oldest blogger" found a new lease of life at the age of 95, when “out of stinginess,” she joked, her grandson began a blog for her as a birthday gift.

Within months, her blog, amis95.blogspot.com, set up on December 23, 2006, had attracted thousands of admirers, enchanted by Lopez’ lively mix of memory (of the Spanish Civil War, of Francoist Spain) opinion (on politics, Iran, and Spain’s teenage binge drinkers) and her daily musings on life, old age and illness. By 2007, the site had been voted best Spanish blog on the web in the blog awards run by Deutsche Welle, the German television channel.

“I am an ordinary woman nothing special” López told Reuters in a 2007 television interview. “I talk about anything.” Teenagers wrote to seek her advice on what degree to choose at university, and she was visited by the Spanish Prime Minister, José Luís Zapatero. López told him she had been a Socialist since the age of 16, and he invited her to pay him a visit in Moncloa, the Presidential Palace.

She described herself as the world’s oldest blogger, following the death in July 2008 of Olive Riley, an 108-year-old blogger and great-great-grandmother from Australia.

López suffered from cataracts and would dictate her blog posts to Daniel her grandson – in a single month, she attracted 51,000 hits. He complained he needed time off to go to work.

The internet, López declared had “taken 20 years off her” and changed her life, putting her in contact with an international community, with friends in every continent.

Last February, she began a Facebook group for rights for the elderly, Ancianos en Acción.

As well as demanding a decent pension and that children bring in a carer to the home of elderly parents rather than placing them in a home, López suggested that all old people needed to be shown how to use the internet. It was she said “a necessity” for old people.

In one of her final postings, a video blog made in February, she said: "When I'm on the Internet, I forget about my illness. The distraction is good for you -- being able to communicate with people. It wakes up the brain, and gives you great strength. Because it makes me feel less lonely, as though I am talking to a friend.”

More than 600 messages have been posted on the site mourning her death, and in a final post, López's family said that for 880 days the blog had made her happy. They wrote: "Wherever you are, grandmother, you will read these comments, all of them without doubt."

María Amelia López Soliño was born on December 23, 1911 in Muxia, a village on the coast of Galicia and died on May 20, 2009