The world lost a legend today. Alan Rickman died in London at the age of 69 after a battle with cancer.

To say Alan Rickman was one of my favorite actors would be an understatement. To say Alan Rickman was one of the most talented actors in the universe would be an even bigger understatement.

Most people my age see Alan Rickman and immediately picture Professor Severus Snape. With good reason. When I read the Harry Potter books, I imagined all of the characters looking certain ways; when I saw the first movie, not all of the characters matched what I had imagined; and when I go back and re-read the books, I still see most of them as I imagined them all those years ago. Not Snape. Snape will forever be Alan Rickman. That is how good he was in the role.

But my love for Alan Rickman goes back much further than Harry Potter. He played the Sheriff of Nottingham in one of my all-time favorite movies, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.

He was the voice of Marvin, the paranoid robot in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a movie that played a pretty big part of my freshman year of college.

I fell in love with him as Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility.

Although I'm not a huge Die Hard fan, who could forget his performance as Hans Gruber? He truly set the stage for all movie villains with his performance. Not bad for someone who didn't start acting until they were 28.

In the real world, Alan Rickman was just as admirable. He met his wife, Rima Horton, in 1965. Although they didn't get married until 47 years into the relationship, he proved that true love does last if you put in the work.

He made the list of Empire Magzine's 100 Sexiest Stars in film history twice - first in 1995 and again in 2007.

Before starting his acting career, Rickman studied graphic design. He even started a successful graphic design company, Graphiti, with friends.

Daniel Radcliffe said it best: “Film sets and theatre stages are all far poorer for the loss of this great actor and man.