ET talks exclusively to Candace Cameron Bure about the death of her good friend, Alan Thicke.
Much like her older brother, Kirk Cameron, Candace Cameron Bure is reeling from the death of beloved actor Alan Thicke.
ET spoke exclusively to Bure on Wednesday, when she opened up about her relationship with Thicke. Aside from Bure's brother starring as Thicke's son on Growing Pains, she recently starred alongside the Canadian television actor when he made a guest appearance on the second season of Netflix's Fuller House. Bure said she found out about Thicke's death from her Fuller House co-star Dave Coulier's wife, Melissa.
"[After that] my mom texted, and my brother texted, and my sister texted, and ... it's weird because you're like, I just talked to him," Bure tells ET's Cameron Mathison. "I just saw him. He wasn't sick. ... He just seemed so healthy, so young, and now he's gone."
Thicke suffered a heart attack while playing hockey with his 19-year-old son, Carter, at the Pickwick Gardens ice skating rink in Burbank, California, on Tuesday. He was later pronounced dead at Providence St. Joseph's Medical Center. Bure shared a hockey connection with Thicke, given that she's been married to former NHL pro Valeri Bure since 1996.
"I mean, my husband's known him for more than 20 years because there's that small hockey family in the business," Bure explains. "[His death] hurt me even more in one sense thinking he was on the ice with his 19 year-old son. I have my 16 year-old son, my 14 year-old son -- they're on the ice every day with my husband. And even my husband said, 'It could be me. It could be me with our boys.' And it's so hard to think about."
"But then you have that other moment that you think, 'but he was doing what he loved, and he was with his son,'" she continues. "You know, we all have an expiration date, we're all going to go, and then you think, well that happened probably at a moment when he was just enjoying what he loved to do and being with his son."
Bure, 40, has fond memories of Thicke, who she's known since she was seven years old when she spent time on the Growing Pains set with her family. Thicke also played Bure's dad in the 2013 Hallmark holiday film Let It Snow.
"Alan has just always been that lovable, kind, gracious man -- great father, great friend," she says. "He just always had a smile on his face, always had a joke to say. And he had that very dry sense of humor too. I know that everyone's going to talk about Alan, and I can't imagine that anyone will have anything negative to say about that guy because that's the kind of person he was."
Bure says she still hasn't talked to her brother personally about Thicke's death, though they've texted. "He just said his heart was broken, and was so sad about it," she shares.
As for her own memories of Thicke's recent appearance on Fuller House, she has nothing but good rememberances. Bure shares that Thicke's son Carter came to the taping, and that her mother baked the special cookies that she always made for Thicke.
"He's so kind, so gracious," Bure says. "He's funny, and so we were so excited when we were told he was going to do an episode of Fuller House. And so he came on, and you know, he's just an old pro. He's fantastic, he's funny."
"He will be so missed," she adds. "But he's so loved. And that's the one thing I feel like he went out with -- so much love. That guy is very loved, and that makes me very happy."
NEWS: 'Fuller House' Star Dave Coulier Says He 'Can't Process' Alan Thicke's Death
On Tuesday, Bure's brother reacted to Thicke's death on Tuesday with an Instagram post of the two of them together on the set of Growing Pains.
"I spent Monday through Friday for seven important years with Alan Thicke as my 'TV dad,'" Cameron wrote. "I'm shocked and truly heartbroken today at the news of his death. Alan was a generous, kind and loving man. I am so blessed to have grown up with him. ... We will cherish the memories... 'sharing the laughter and love.'"
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