Tammy Faye Messner, favorite televangelist of many in the 1980s and 1990s, died Saturday at age 65, after a long and painful battle with cancer.

CNN’s Larry King announced on the channel’s website that Tammy Faye has died, adding that her family asked him to make a delayed announcement. He interviewed the struggling televangelist Thursday, on his talk show.

“She died peacefully,” Larry King said on CNN’s website.

The interview on Thursday was an emotional one, as Tammy Faye told King she feared this would be her last television appearance. Painfully thin, her voice raspy, in pain, she said she kept her faith in God.

“I believe when I leave this Earth, because I love the Lord, I am going straight to Heaven,” she said.

There was a glimpse of hope for her, as she said she had gained a bit of weight. She had nevertheless withered to a mere 65 pounds. She said she could not hold food down. On her website, she asked fans to prey for her, adding that she would be happy to be able to eat a hamburger again.

Earlier this year, she announced that she was no longer following any treatment for her inoperable cancer and that she would only take medicine for her pain from now on.

Tammy Faye was first diagnosed with colon cancer in 1996. In 2004, she announced it had spread to her lungs and that it was inoperable. During Thursday’s interview with King, she said she had asked doctors not to tell her how much longer she had to live.

 “I asked them not to tell me. I don't want my faith levels to go away,” Messner said. She said she now receives hospice care and morphine to mute the pain, which she feels “all the time.”

 Tammy Faye also told viewers: “I genuinely love you and I genuinely care. And I genuinely want to see you in heaven someday.”

Messner is the former wife of televangelist Jim Bakker. The two founded the PTL Club (Praise the Lord), a religious group and evangelical television program they hosted from 1976 to 1987. Jim Bakker was indicted of fraud and tax evasion in the late 1980s.

Tammy Faye divorced him in 1992, while Bakker was serving his 18-year jail sentence for financial fraud. She remarried in 1993.