The mother of murdered school girl Milly Dower has described the cruel false hope she experienced when voicemails were erased from her daughter’s phone.

Sally Dowler revealed the moment of euphoria when she discovered messages had been deleted from the teenager’s phone, while she was still missing.

Mrs Dowler had been calling her phone repeatedly in the weeks following Milly’s disappearance in 2002, but could no longer hear her voicemail message when it became full.

But, while waiting to review CCTV at the Birds Eye building in Walton, which is on the road where Milly was last seen, it rang through again as normal.

She told the Leveson Inquiry on Monday, November 21: “I just jumped and said: ‘She’s picked up her voicemails Bob, she’s alive’.”

She immediately told Milly’s older sister Gemma the news, and her friends, but said it “died down” when her daughter’s disappearance continued and hope faded.

Mrs Dowler said that moment was the first thing she thought of when police told her, ahead of Levi Bellfield’s murder trial this year, that a private detective working for the News of the World had hacked into the voicemails.

Mrs Dowler told the inquiry of her sleepless nights after police delivered the blow.

She told the room full of reporters and lawyers: “As soon as I was told it was about phone hacking I literally didn’t sleep for three nights.”

The Dowlers were the first witnesses to give evidence at the inquiry, which has been set up to examine the culture, practices and ethics of the media well as the press’s relationship with the public, police and politicians.

David Sherborne, who is representing all 51 of the inquiry’s core witnesses, said: “Perhaps there are no words which can adequately describe how despicable this act was, but the Dowler story is just one of those you will hear.”

Mr Dowler, when asked what he would like to say to News of the World publisher News International, said: “We would sincerely hope that News International and other media organisations would look very carefully how they procure, how they obtain information about stories.”

Mr Sherborne said the issue was bigger than just phones hacking, and was also about the unacceptable intrusion of the press during a time of unbearable grief.

The inquiry heard the Dowlers also were secretly photographed as they retraced Milly’s last steps and described their anger at the intrusion.

Mr Sherborne said: “Alongside the picture was a caption which read as follows, ‘Mile of grief. The Dowlers follow Milly’s footsteps from Walton station and below mum Sally can’t help but touch the poster of her daughter’.

“First stolen voicemail messages. Why not then steal these precious moments too? Ethically, what's the difference?”