Former wrestler and Ninth Wonder of the World, Chyna

Chyna, the 1990s WWE star who became one of the best known and most popular female professional wrestlers in history, has died.

Police in southern California said they were responding to an emergency call from a friend of the former wrestler when they found her dead in her Redondo Beach apartment.

A friend had gone to check on Chyna, whose real name was Joan Marie Laurer, after she had failed to answer her phone for a few days, police said.

The 46-year-old was dead when officers arrived, police said. Several media outlets report that she was 45.

Neither police nor coroner’s officials have released any cause of death.

Tall, muscle-bound, raven-haired Laurer billed herself as the Ninth Wonder of the World because her wrestling predecessor Andre the Giant had already called himself the eighth.

She was a member of the wrestling squad that dubbed itself D-Generation X, often wrestled against men and at one point was the WWE women’s champion.

Laurer was from Rochester, New York, and graduated from the University of Tampa in Florida before taking up wrestling. After leaving the WWE in 2001, Laurer posed for Playboy and appeared in adult films and on reality TV.

Laurer delighted fans in Perth and Dundee last August when she spent the day signing autographs in both city’s before the Hell for Lycra XII event at the Caird Hall.