TINY Diff'rent Strokes star Gary Coleman has married a woman half his age in a secret mountain top ceremony.


The 4ft 8in star married 22-year-old Shannon Price in August in Nevada, US, but they have been keeping their vows under wraps, the pair told celebrity television show Inside Edition.


"Nobody was around but the minister, preacher, the videographers, the photographer, the helicopter pilot and us," Coleman, 40, said.


Coleman met Price on the set of the 2006 comedy Church Ball. Price said it was she who proposed to Coleman, but that he surprised her on her birthday by whisking her to a mountaintop to exchange vows.


She said they kept their wedding secret because she wanted to keep being seen as her own person.


"I just want my own identity as well because I don't want to be known as Gary Coleman's wife," she said.


Coleman played down their age differences, saying "I don't have issues with age, I have issues with intelligence...

"She's more intelligent than I am and that's what matters to me."


Price, who is 5ft 7in played down the height gap.


"That doesn't really matter to me," she said.

"He was 10 feet tall to me because he was sweet and I really liked his personality."