A Royal Love Story When Catherine met Prince William A documentary from 2010

This is a new era now, a modern king-in-waiting with a very modern bride. She's so modest in herself, she'd just be going through day-to-day life thinking it's a normal relationship. The fact that she knows him so well will assist them to be a great partnership. She is very much one of us, a genuine people's princess. Everything to like and nothing to dislike. How great is that? Rumours of a royal romance first surfaced in 2004 when Kate was photographed skiing with William. The following year there was even speculation about marriage, hotly denied by the prince. So Prince William, romance clearly in the air here. Could there be another wedding perhaps on the card sometime soon? No, I don't think so. He wasn't ready then but much has changed in the interview years. His friends and family have been showing him the way to the altar, one after the other. I think it's very significant that for the first time since 1660, a major member of the royal family who's in line to the throne is marrying a commoner. She's a very sensible, very grounded, poised woman and she has no hint of aristocratic blood, which of course Lady Diana Spencer and the Queen Mother did, both being daughters of earls. And so this is a big new departure for the royal family. There's less sense of the weight of Burke's peerage or the European sense of royalty mattering. What matters I think is that she's capable of becoming queen. Her background is just one aspect of their very modern love story, one that began in the very ancient setting of St Andrew's University. William's first day at St Andrew's was a big event in the small season of Ty. You first set eyes on each other and what did you think? Well it's a long time ago now Tom, I'm trying to rack my brain about it all. But we were obviously, we met at university at St Andrew's and we were friends for over a year first and it just sort of blossomed from then on. We just spent more time with each other, had a good giggle, had lots of fun and realised we shared the same interests and just had a really good time. She's got a really nice sense of humour, which kind of helps me because I've got a very dirty sense of humour. So it was good fun, we had a really good laugh and then things happened. Prince William was smitten. Soon William and Kate had started a love affair and in their second year, like millions of other students, they shared a flat with two friends in a terraced house in St Andrew's street, renowned for its parties. We, no, we moved in together as friends and then because we were living together we lived with a couple of others as well and it just sort of blossomed from there really. We just saw more of each other, you know, hung out a bit more and did stuff so yeah. Do you like my cooking? Well your cooking's alright, it's got better. Does William ever cook or indeed do anything useful around the house? Let's not go there. He does actually, he did cook for me quite a bit at university and it would always come with a bit of angst and a bit of anger if something had gone wrong and I'd have to wander in and save something that was going. So being honest, is that a skill that's declining over time or improving? I would say I'm getting better at cooking. Kate would say I'm getting a lot worse. I didn't give you enough chance to practice the moves. No, that is true. I get quite lazy about cooking because, you know, when I come back from work and stuff it's the last thing I want to do really is spend the rest of the time cooking but when I was trying to impress Kate I was trying to cook these amazing fancy dinners and all that would happen was I'd burn something, something would overspill, something would catch on fire and she'd be sitting in the background just trying to help and basically taking control of the whole situation so I was quite glad she was there at the time. Slightly awkward for the other flatmates or okay? No, to be honest they were hopefully happy with it, they were used to it watching me sort of catching things fire and, you know, they found it very amusing. But I mean having the two of you going out in the flat or did they just not bat an eyelid? I think at first they were sort of a bit surprised that it was what happened and then they realised it was really nice and it was good fun and we got on really well. They were good friends of ours as well and so we had a good giggle with them as well. Katherine Middleton. But if like all students they played hard, they also studied hard. Kate would be the first student to have been to university. William Wales. And there to watch Prince William receive his 2-1, Prince Owen his father and his stepfather but also his dear aunts. Outside the Queen congratulated William. This was a significant moment in the relationship. Kate's first brush with William's family and she didn't look daunted at all. It was at Sandhurst at William's passing out parade that Kate made her first official appearance as Prince William's girlfriend. While William pounded the parade ground in front of his grandmother, Kate was telling her friends just what she thought of her man. A lip reader revealed her innermost thoughts to be, I love him in uniform, he's so, so sexy. Not a remark you'd often hear in royal circles. Kate already a breath of fresh air in William's closeted world. But while at official engagements Kate was to some extent protected from press intrusion, there was suddenly interest in every aspect of her life. After she faced this daunting pack of paparazzi on her birthday, her lawyers demanded some respect for her privacy. The parallels with Princess Diana just before her engagement were painfully clear. How well are you coping with all the press attention? Well, as you can see, you can tell. Are you bearing up with it quite well though? Because it must be quite a strain with all of us after you. Well, it is. William is somebody that wants to protect his girlfriend and rather he doesn't want to see the same difficulties that his mother experienced with the media. So he's there doing his best to protect her. Prince William would tell her about the life his mother had, the trauma she had, the stress she had. The one thing that you could say about Kate, that she would think things through for herself. You know, Diana wasn't like that. She was kind of, Diana was impetuous. I watched Diana from the very beginning right through to the very end and I saw really the rise, the rise and then the demise of this woman. After Sandhurst, William joined his regiment, the Blues and Royals. He took to army life with gusto, but Kate was nowhere to be seen. The future of an heir to the throne is mapped out very precisely. Kate's status was far less clear. She was public property, but not yet part of the firm. The realities of royal life had begun to tell on the young couple. Once William had made that public statement that they were over, she said, well, I'm going to go out and have fun. And I think that's when William suddenly saw these pictures in the newspapers of her leaving nightclubs with quite eligible young men and thought, I've made a bit of a mistake here. By the summer of 2007, at the concert William and Harry organised in memory of their mother, rumours of a reconciliation had surfaced. I've got lots of friends coming, so, you know, everyone's going to be there on the night, and it's going to be a great night, basically. That's very well avoided, William. Soon there was no such coyness, and by the time William received his wings from his father at the end of his stint with the RAF, how things had changed. Kate, very much the official girlfriend again, shared jokes with Diana's sister, a measure of just how much she'd been welcomed by all of William's family. Then, for the first time since they'd started their relationship, William and Kate walked out side by side in front of the cameras, the break-up well behind them. Kate had taken up her place at the heart of the royal family. I think the fact that they've broken up, of course, and got back together, the fact that they've lived together in the past, the fact that they've really had the kind of modern relationship that most people have, is a good thing for the royal family. I think it does bring them into the 21st century in a way that is positive. So, if this is the relationship that's blown apart, the traditional method of choosing a royal bride, a modern romance in every sense, what do we know about the girl who's gone from Bucklebury to Buckingham Palace, the girl who will one day call this her home? There aren't many little girls who don't dream of becoming a princess one day. Who knows what Kate's childish dreams were made of, but what a perfect coincidence that her parents made their fortune with an online business which sells dresses for little princesses. Kate's background is a mixture. She is a middle-class girl that's been well educated in the circles, so much so that she was able to mix with a future king. I think the great thing about Kate is that we don't know a lot about Kate. She's kept herself quite protected. She's given no interviews. She's said nothing, and it's been a model of discretion. Every stage of his life has been documented, from his first day at school to his appearance on the royal balcony, the perfect advantage point to all faces, and his first nervous interviews in front of the press pack under the watchful eye of his father. How are you going to be able to keep in touch? Email my father or something like that. I think if the royal family is going to go into the 21st century and be taken seriously, it has to be representative of the people that effectively pay these people's wages, and Kate Middleton has got all of those qualities. I think she's somebody who I think will complement Prince William as he grows into his role as the future king. Well, this is where the future queen grew up, the Middletons' comfortable family home in Berkshire. The Middletons were wealthy enough to send Kate to public school at Marlborough College, where she kept her eye on her prince. She never said anything about marrying him or getting engaged to him or even being in a relationship with him, but, oh, yeah, she thought he was very nice-looking. We all have Prince William on our ward, but I have Prince Harry, but she had Prince William. Unaware he was a pin-up in the girls' dorm, at this time, William was studying at Eton. His education included learning to cook for himself. What else was it? Although he probably preferred his time on the playing fields or in the swimming pool, where he was captain of water polo, Kate was equally sporty, a love of exercise, something they share. We played hockey together and tennis. She was an incredible swimmer, but she was also quite famous for being a cricketer as well and a bit of a touch rugby player. She was pretty good. She's independent as well. I think that's what's very important. I feel incredibly proud and I think she would be proud of herself as well, but she's so modest in herself. She'd just be going through day-to-day life thinking it's a normal relationship and she's obviously got a lovely fiancé and she's going to be spending the rest of her life with him. I don't think for a moment that Kate Middleton wants to be the kind of queen that Princess Diana would have been had she survived. I think that those days are well over. The kind of glamour and the dancing and the sheer sort of Hollywood side of the job is something that the royal family have quite rightly stepped away from in the last 10 years and she, I think, is part of that. She certainly has the looks and the presence and I think that once she becomes an HRH and eventually queen, she will have the dignity. No one's trying to fill my mother's shoes and what she did is fantastic. It's about making your own future and your own destiny and Kate will do a very good job of that. I don't think there's a great progressive streak in either of them. I think they're both traditionalists. Going back to the present queen and Prince Philip, who I think have made a strength of being traditionalists. The two words summarise what they think is very, very important and they are duty and family. I think William and Kate, for those, are going to be their mantras. Well, I personally think Kate Middleton is a princess for the 21st century. She comes from the people. She's not the people's princess like Diana, but she's certainly a princess of the people. I don't know the ropes really, William. I was obviously used to it, but now I'm willing to learn quickly and work hard. Very lovely down-to-earth person. Yeah, good luck to her. She was one of the rare genuine people that you get in this world that don't come along very often. Want to see a fairytale wedding with masses of coaches and carriages and old heads of state from all over the world come into the wedding? Of course we do. This is oxygen for us. Great. We're hugely excited and we're looking forward to spending the rest of our lives together and see what the future holds. The whole caravan of the story will continue. It's been going on for a thousand years and it's going to continue for a few more years yet. The Queen loves her. That's all that really matters. You know, the others will love her too. But the most important thing is, of course, William loves her and the Queen would love him to be happily married.