Recording a verdict of death by non-dependent abuse of drugs, he told the court: "The evidence does not point to this being a deliberate act of suicide. It seems most improbable that she would attempt to kill herself with her daughter in the house. Her behaviour was foolish and incautious."
Miss Yates, 41, died at her home in Notting Hill, west London, on September 17, after moving back from a break in Hastings.
The last adult to see her was a former heroin addict she had met at the Priory clinic, but her four-year-old daughter Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily, whose father Michael Hutchence died three years ago, was alone with her when she died.
Pathologist Iain West told the court he had found morphine in her blood, but no trace of alcohol or other illegal drugs.
"The powerful narcotic drug depressed the cells of the brain which basically stopped her breathing," he said.
Miss Yates's close friend Belinda Brewin, who visited her on the evening before her death, told the court: "She was slightly staggering, her eyelids were drooping, she was slightly incoherent. I could tell that she had been taking drugs.
"I said, 'What the hell are you doing this for after all this time?' She hadn't taken drugs, illegal drugs, for nearly two years. She said it was the pressure of being back in London."
After bathing Miss Yates because she had been sick, Mrs Brewin left the star in a "quite coherent" state. Unknown to Mrs Brewin, Charlotte Korshak, a former heroin addict, was upstairs throughout the visit and was the last person to see Miss Yates.
Miss Korshak, 21, told police that Miss Yates had taken heroin, cocaine, ecstasy and acid "from time to time".
But she said she did not see Miss Yates take any drugs on September 16 and when asked by the coroner if she had supplied Miss Yates with illegal drugs replied: "Absolutely not." She told the court she left her friend "fine, in a really good mood, happy".
Miss Yates's body was found by her longstanding friend Josephine Fairley Sams, who visited the house after trying to call her repeatedly. She was let in by Tiger Lily. "I rushed upstairs to tell Paula to wake up and took one look at her and knew she was dead," she told the court.
"She was naked, half-out of the bed. I touched her and she was very cold."
Miss Yates found fame in the 1980s as co-presenter of Channel 4 show The Tube, and as girlfriend and later wife of Sir Bob Geldof. They had three children - Fifi Trixibelle, 17, Peaches, 11, and Pixie, 10 - but in 1995 she left him for INXS singer Michael Hutchence. An acrimonious divorce and custody battle followed.
Amid a blaze of headlines she gave birth to Hutchence's daughter, Tiger Lily. But only 14 months later he was found hanged by a belt in his Sydney hotel room in November 1997. Miss Yates refused to accept the coroner's verdict of suicide. Her life was rocked again when it was revealed that her father was not the late TV presenter Jess Yates, as she had believed, but another TV personality, the late Hughie Green. Following Miss Yates's death Tiger Lily was made a ward of court and is being cared for by Sir Bob, who already had custody of his three children.
After the inquest Miss Yates's solicitor, Anthony Burton, read a statement on behalf of her friends. "An inquest tells you how someone died, not how they lived. It gives no clue to the fullness and joy of Paula's life. Her friends will always remember her as loving, affectionate and witty."
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