[1][2] Andersson had been a child prodigy who won the Swedish television quiz show 10.000-kronorsfrågan ("The 10,000 Kronor Question") at the age of 16.

[3] From his late teen years, he was also a well-known science fiction fan in Sweden, who chaired the MalCon in 1966 in Malmö[4] and took over editing the pioneering Swedish science fiction amateur journal, the Scandinavian Amateur Press Alliance (SAPA) after John-Henri Holmberg left the position some time after 1964.

[5] Andersson studied astronomy at Lund University,[6] but received a scholarship to San Michele Observatory in on the island of Anacapri in Sicily in 1968.

[13] He mapped the far side of the Moon in NASA's Catalogue of Lunar Nomenclature, with co-author Ewen Whitaker, published in 1982.

[1][16] The University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory Leif Erland Andersson Award for Service and Outreach is awarded annually to a Planetary Science graduate student in recognition for attention to broader impacts and involvement in activities outside of academic responsibilities that benefit the department, university, and the larger community.