If you live The Life Of Reilly it suggests that you live a charmed life of ease. The phrase’s origin is unclear, but it perhaps lies with the earliest recorded reference, in a song called “My Name Is Kelly”, written by H Pearse in 1919. A popular music hall song, it included the lines “Faith and my name is Kelly, Michael Kelly, but I'm living the life of Reilly just the same.” The lyric is a reference to an earlier music hall song performed during the 1880s. This song described a character called O'Reilly, a working-class Irish immigrant, who was always claiming to be on the verge of hitting the big time, making himself and everyone around him rich in the process.