Finding out someone died 24 years ago

I saw a thread earlier similar to what just happened to me, I had a friend for two years 1986-87. We lived together, went out everywhere together. We broke up and went our own ways. I always thought he might be in London doing his thing and hopeful he was happy. I even thought he might be back in Sydney. The other day, a old friend I tracked down on Instagram, I reminded her, that Stuart would know, she replied, I don't know how long you've been out of the loop, so to speak, Stuart died in 1997. I was totally devastated. I was itching to meet up with him. She told me the meds came to late to save Stuart. Well...I want to cry, I wondered if he suffered, was he lonely, who will remember him, his mum came over to London from Australia to be with him in his last moments. I want to scream, 24 years have gone, as far as I might have known he was doing his thing. I looked up any information and I couldn't find anything. I had a photo, so I put up a memorial named Stuartmoore.muchloved.com and now I realise all the grieving is done, he hasn't had any visits to his memorial and I am an old fool. He was just short of 38 years old. All this time I've thought he was growing old like me, one day we would meet up. But I just can't get it around my head, he died in a London hospital all this time ago. Things could have been different. I loved Stuart, but we parted. I met someone, I've been with 33 years. I just feel how hopeless it is to come to sense or reason this happened.