WHO said romance was dead? Chorley airline pilot Fabrizio Poli proposed to wife Silvia just two weeks after they met. Three-and-a-half months later they were married.

And the pair, who live in Burgh Wood Way with sons Benjamin, five, Elrond, two, and Nike, 11 months, have enjoyed seven-and-a-half years of wedded bliss.

They will tell their remarkable tale in the second series of BBC 3's Wedding Stories, due to be broadcast before Christmas.

Fabrizio, 36, a Ryanair pilot, life coach and author of self-help book Your Attitude Determines Your Altitude, met 32-year-old herbalist student Silvia in unusual circumstances -- kneeling at the altar.

Fabrizio explained: "We were both visiting a Mormon temple in Switzerland. I was a friend of Silvia's cousin and I was holding a special eternal marriage ceremony for my late grandparents.

"We needed a woman to stand in for my grandmother and we ended up using Silvia. We knelt at the altar together and both felt each other was "the one" but neither of us said anything. I didn't know what to do.

"Two weeks later I went to her sister's wedding in Milan and as we were in the hotel waiting for the couple to arrive, I just said: "Will you marry me?

"After she realised I wasn't joking she accepted. Everyone thought we were crazy, but we knew it was the right thing to do."

Fabrizio and Silvia are in good company -- latest reports from the Office of National Statistics show 4.7 per cent more couples tied the knot in 2003 than 2002 and figures are expected to keep rising.

Before this, marriage rates had been steadily dropping every year since the early 1970s when it became more socially acceptable for couples to live together.

So with more couples taking the plunge, what's the secret of a successful marriage?

"We deal with everyday challenges as a family," said Silvia.

"And we have an order of priority which says your spouse should be number one," said Fabrizio. "We have found from experience when couples have problems it is because the man will put the children first or the woman will listen to her mother more than her husband," he added.

As practising Mormons, the couple do not believe in sex outside marriage -- and this helped them forge a strong bond in the early days, they said.

"In those four months before we married we spoke a lot about the things that really counted, our goals and values," said Fabrizio.

"We built a solid friendship and concentrated on working out what we had in common.

"Sex is very important in marriage. It's like the roof of a house in that it's necessary, but you have to build the walls of the house first."

"The happiest times on this earth can only be experienced in a family," said Silvia.

"You can't have such happiness anywhere else. Many people think sex and money bring happiness but spending time with your husband and children is real happiness."