What Diana revealed to me about William – and the type of King he’ll become

It’s still a thing. Becoming a teenager. And today Prince George is 13. But he’s launching into this new chapter from a far more secure base than his father had at the same age. Personally, I can’t think of anything worse than being born into this preordained life in which you have no choice about your “career”, you are constantly set apart from everyone else, and people like me spend their time pontificating about you. Of course it’s a life which comes with enormous privilege, but what a price a young prince must pay. George, though, is lucky. Luckier than his dad, luckier than his grandfather. He’s entering his notoriously tricky teenage years with the solid grounding of a very happy childhood, brought up by parents who adore one another and their children. Unlike Charles and William, he was not sent away to boarding school when he was eight. Instead he’s enjoyed going to a day school with his sister and brother and the rough and tumble of family life at home. As it happens, William’s mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, invited me to her home in Kensington Palace just around the time of his 13th birthday. We sat in her living room facing one another on comfy settees, and talked about all that was happening in her troubled and often dramatic life. She’d been officially separated from Charles for more than two years and it was just five months before she went public with her unhappiness in that now discredited Panorama interview with Martin Bashir. She and I covered much of the same ground on that warm June morning at the Palace: she was extraordinarily candid about her views on her marriage, her life and her love rival, Camilla. But she insisted it wasn’t for broadcast. She did, however, happily talk about her sons. They were both at boarding school, and the Princess had framed pictures of them dotted around her living room. She missed them. She told me that William, on the cusp of becoming a teenager, felt what she called the “burden of kingship” weighed heavily on his shoulders. She said he’d complained that people were already treating him as if he were king. But she was confident that he would learn to handle it. “William is alright,” she said proudly, adding “the country is very lucky to have William”. Diana, Princess of Wales with her son William in his playroom in Kensington Palace in 1985 (Photo: Tim Graham Photo Library via Getty) But life was not about to get any easier for him. After years of witnessing the strife between his parents, seeing headlines about their private lives splashed all over the newspapers, and acting as chief comforter to his sobbing mother, he was soon to lose her completely in a fatal car crash in Paris. George has, of course, had to cope with the trauma of his mother’s shock cancer diagnosis and the effects of her treatment, and that must be hugely unsettling for any youngster, but he has had both his parents and his Middleton grandparents to support him. William and Catherine have encouraged all their children to be open about their fears and feelings. The Windsor “stiff upper lip” is not for them – at least in private. You get the impression that they’re being brought up in a great big bubble of love in which their parents have unashamedly put their children first, ring-fencing school holidays despite jibes that they should be working. In September, there will be quite a gear change for George when he starts at Eton. For William it was a sanctuary – away from prying eyes and the turmoil of a broken home. For George it will probably be more of a wrench, living for the first time away from his parents and siblings. But, once again, he will have his father as his guide and mentor. William knows all about life at Eton as well as the pressure of being an heir to the throne, and that “burden of kingship”. He is perfectly placed to help his son through his teenage years. So, happy birthday George, you’re a lucky young man – even though few of us would truly envy the hand fate has dealt you.