In the concluding extract from an authoritative new biography of the Princess of Wales, ROBERT JOBSON recounts the ups and downs of Kate’s romance with university sweetheart William, why he got cold feet — and the ‘Freakin Naughty’ fancy dress party where their ‘chemistry’ was rekindled.
She’d waited several years for him to make up his mind, and quite suddenly he had. Prince William, then the world’s most eligible bachelor, had decided it was just too soon to be tied down to Catherine Middleton.
He celebrated their break-up with an alcohol-fuelled night at the Mahiki nightclub in Mayfair with his close pals.
‘I’m free!’ he shouted as he slipped into a drunken version of the robot dance. He then told his friends that they should all ‘drink the menu’, which they more or less ended up doing.
Naturally, Catherine got to hear about these juvenile antics. They seemed to mark a humiliating end to the romance that had begun when they were both students at the University of St Andrews in Scotland.
The gossip columnists had a field day. Some claimed William ‘had his head turned’ by another young woman — the beautiful socialite Isabella Anstruther-Gough-Calthorpe.
They’d met years before on holiday in Greece. But despite being single at the time of William and Catherine’s break-up, Isabella was apparently unkeen on becoming a royal girlfriend, feeling it would limit her career prospects as an actress.
This did not cool William’s ardour: he reportedly tried to woo Isabella, visiting her several times at her family home. Despite his evident crush, she apparently rebuffed his advances.
Few could have predicted that he’d return to Catherine — or that she’d ever agree to take him back…
There’s always been far more to the current Princess of Wales than the smiling rather placid image she has sometimes projected in public. For one thing, she’s very bright, has an inquiring mind and has always been mature for her age.
At the age of just three, she was being encouraged to learn Arabic. The Middleton family were then living in Amman, Jordan, where her father Michael was working for two and a half years as a dispatcher for British Airways.
They weren’t exactly living the ex-pat high life: from May 1984, they rented a modest three-bedroom villa for £300 a month. Catherine attended a nursery school where, each morning, she’d recite rhymes including Incy Wincy Spider in both Arabic and English.
‘To improve the children’s Arabic, we’d delve into a verse from the Qur’an,’ recalled their teacher, Sahera al Nabulsi. ‘And then we’d share tales of the Prophet’s companions, like Umar ibn Al-Khattab, underscoring values of respect and love.’
At Christmas, Ms al Nabulsi would pretend to be Father Christmas, while Eid al-Fitr, marking the end of Ramadan, was enlivened with the sound of drumming.
After three years in Jordan, the Middletons returned in 1986 to their home in West Berkshire. Shortly afterwards, Catherine was enrolled at the fee-paying St Andrew’s preparatory school in Pangbourne, where her teachers described her as very conscientious, a hard worker and a natural athlete — all traits that still apply.
Today, Catherine would be the first to agree that her period in the Middle East, many elements of which she still recalls, has helped shape the woman she has become. One of the causes closest to her heart is to highlight the crucial importance of a child’s early years — up to five years old.
In 2018, when Prince William attended a reception in Amman, the chief executive of the Save the Children Fund in Jordan told him she knew the house where Catherine had lived.
‘No way!’ he replied. ‘She will be thrilled. She loved it here, she really did. She is very upset that I am coming here without her.’
Thanks to her mother, Carole, who launched a highly successful business selling items for children’s parties, the Middleton children were sent to expensive independent schools. However, Catherine failed to settle after starting aged 13 as a day-pupil at Downe House, still known for its pupils’ high academic attainments.
Was she bullied? Perhaps. It’s fair to say she struggled to fit in. She felt like an outsider, chiefly because her peer group had been together at the school since the age of 11 and had already bonded.
After just two terms at the all‑girls Downe House, her parents whipped her out in 1996 and sent her to Marlborough College in Wiltshire, which admitted both sexes — and within weeks of starting there, the wan expression had left Catherine’s face.
Contemporaries remember her indulging in Marmite sandwiches, listening to her Walkman and avidly watching the U.S. television show Friends.
They also say she was a ‘perfect pupil’ — and indeed she achieved 11 GCSEs followed by three A-levels, with A grades in Maths and Art and a B in English.
At 16, she ditched her braces and morphed into a beauty. She was soon top of the schoolboys’ so-called ‘Fit List’, which they’d circulate and pin up on their walls.
Much like other girls her age, Catherine had a few teenage romances. Her first ‘love’ was Harry Blakelock, a fellow student at Marlborough College, who later became an insurance broker.
Their youthful relationship had its ups and downs, and ultimately ended before the start of her gap year. Neither of them have talked about it, but friends say Catherine had become very attached to Harry, and was heartbroken when they parted ways.
Did she also have a schoolgirl crush on Prince William, then at Eton College? A former housemate claimed Catherine had a picture of him on her wall. She has, however, firmly denied this, saying: ‘No, I had the Levis’ guy on my wall, not a picture of William — sorry.’
What’s less well known is that Catherine and the Prince first met when she was at Marlborough, and it was then that they actually became friends. ‘There was plenty of socialising [between pupils at both schools] back then, and they were known to each other,’ said a senior source close to the Middletons. ‘I understand he invited her on a few things.’
Initially, Catherine set her sights on Edinburgh University to do a History of Art degree, even confirming her place. But doubts crept in at the eleventh hour, and she decided to take a gap year first, which she largely spent abroad.
Why then, on her return, did she subsequently apply to the University of St Andrews? The gossip mill would later go into overdrive, not only alleging she’d changed her mind because she’d heard William was going there, but that her mother had encouraged her to catch the eye of the Prince.
This is ‘utter nonsense’, said a source close to the family. Indeed, it had been confidently expected the Prince would attend Trinity College, Cambridge, like his father.
In 2001, William quietly slipped into undergraduate life at St Andrews, where he used the pseudonym ‘Steve’ in a rather pathetic attempt to stay under the radar. He soon struck up an intimate friendship with a stunning student, Carly Massy-Birch.
A country girl from Devon, Carly clicked with the Prince straight away. They talked about literature, played board games together and attended dinner parties with pals or drank pints of cider at The Castle pub.
Their relationship dissolved at the end of the first term, however, after William admitted he felt torn between her and another girl, Arabella Musgrave — daughter of the manager of Cirencester Park Polo Club. He’d fallen for Arabella at a party in 2001, and they’d enjoyed a passionate summer romance just before he went up to St Andrews.
William had been very keen on her, but they’d mutually agreed that it would be better to cool their relationship.
Once at university, however, he found he missed her. So they’d arrange to meet at weekends, whenever he went back to Highgrove, his father’s country home.
At St Andrews, he was cautious about whom he’d admit into his friendship group. ‘People who try to take advantage of me and get a piece of me, I spot it quickly and soon go off them. I’m not stupid,’ he said.
One of his close friends from quite early on was, of course, the pretty girl from Marlborough. He and Catherine had met again when they found themselves sharing the same hall of residence, and began to go out for drinks and play the odd game of tennis together.
‘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,’ William would say later.
Catherine’s infectious energy set her apart. He found himself smiling every time she laughed and admired the way that — unlike him — she threw herself into all aspects of student life. Then, famously, he started seeing her in a different light in March 2002 when she strutted down the catwalk in a student charity show, wearing a daring black sheer ensemble that showed off her figure.
From that pivotal moment, William knew he wanted to be more than just friends.
As for Catherine, she was casually involved at the time with Rupert Finch, a fourth-year law student, but they soon went their separate ways.
In their second academic year, William and Catherine moved into a student house along with two undergraduate friends. Among the student community, it was an open secret that they were a couple: they could often be seen walking or cycling to lectures or browsing the aisles of the local Safeway.
For weekends and holidays, he’d often whisk Catherine off to Highgrove or Sandringham or to a cottage on the Balmoral estate. Occasionally they checked into hotels, using the names Mr and Mrs Smith — which doubtless fooled no one.
In May 2003, news of their relationship broke — though William insisted a month later that he didn’t have a steady girlfriend. He may have been telling the truth, as the couple briefly broke up that year.
By August, the romance was back on, and they’d decided to move to a cottage on a private country estate. This served as their sanctuary for their final two years of undergraduate life, though they also went out to bars and attended student balls.
All this came to an end in 2005, when both graduated with upper second-class honours degrees. Following the ceremony, William introduced Catherine’s parents to the Queen, marking a significant step forward in their relationship.
Then it was on to London, where Catherine had a flat near the King’s Road in Chelsea.
As William’s girlfriend, she danced at the trendiest clubs and enjoyed the VIP treatment that came with dating a royal.
Speculation about a royal marriage began to approach fever pitch, but the Prince was wary of committing himself. It might well be a case of the right girl at the wrong time, he feared.
While he wrestled with doubts, Catherine was having to deal with the daily reality of being a royal girlfriend. She could be taking tea with the Queen at Windsor Castle one day; the next she’d be running for a bus, trailed by numerous paparazzi.
By the time she turned 24, William had embarked on a year’s military training at Sandhurst. He nevertheless met up with Catherine every Friday evening at the Middletons’ five-bedroom home in Berkshire.
The Middletons were invited, along with Catherine, to his military graduation in December 2006. It was William’s big day, but the newspapers inevitably focused on the significance of his girlfriend’s presence. A few weeks later, the Sunday Times published a lengthy article under the headline, ‘The girl who would be Queen’.
What could go wrong? Plenty. Already — with no sign of an engagement — Catherine was being labelled Waity Katie, and criticised for first working for her mother’s Party Pieces business rather than starting a career, then taking a part-time job as an accessories buyer at Jigsaw.
There were also ‘raised eyebrows’ in the Royal Family over her frequent trips to Mustique in the southern Caribbean. Her boss at Jigsaw had given Catherine the use of her luxurious villa on the island for private romantic holidays with the Prince — hardly a perk afforded to most employees.
Catherine knew William wasn’t in any hurry to propose, and the truth is she was prepared to wait until he was ready. After all, they were in love — weren’t they?
As Catherine approached her 25th birthday in January 2007, he unexpectedly cancelled plans to attend a New Year gathering in Dundee, arranged by the Middletons.
She sensed something was wrong. It certainly wasn’t helping that newspapers were confidently predicting a royal engagement. Soon afterwards, seemingly out of the blue, William — now a 2nd Lieutenant in the Blues and Royals — telephoned her to suggest that they split up.
He told her they both needed ‘a bit of space’ to ‘find our own way’, and he was unable to promise her marriage. In an emotionally charged 30-minute conversation, they both acknowledged they were on ‘different pages’.
It was a devastating blow to Catherine, who felt doubly let down at being dumped over the phone. Though it wasn’t the first time William had called time on their relationship, it felt final.
In the wake of the break-up, doubts began to creep in. Had she been led on, she asked herself?
Although she was distraught, Catherine resolved to hide her pain from the outside world. Carole Middleton acted swiftly, taking her heartbroken daughter for a break in Dublin — a welcome respite from media scrutiny. William, of course, simply got drunk at Mahiki and started yelling about being ‘free’.
On Catherine’s return, she decided she wasn’t going to sit around moping; what was good for the goose was good for the gander. She turned to old friends for support, going on holiday with a girlfriend to Ibiza.
They partied long into the night. Back in London, there were soon so many paparazzi shots of Catherine leaving nightclubs — often with her sister Pippa — that the media dubbed them the ‘Sizzler Sisters’.
In public at least, Catherine seemed more vibrant and sociable than ever before. One evening, she even donned silk Playboy bunny ears to attend a party to promote Rabbit Fever, a movie about women obsessed with a brand of vibrator.
Predictably, the gossip columns chronicled her every move, making it difficult for William to put her out of his mind.
After years as his loyal girlfriend, she seemed to be enjoying herself without him. Her heels were higher, and the outfits she wore — that sometimes bared her midriff or her spectacular legs — were far racier. She was even said to be dating Sir Henry Ropner, a shipping heir. For William, after his initial wave of drunken nights out, it was a different story. As an army officer, he was holed up in his barracks for most of the summer.
Seeing photographs of his ex‑girlfriend having fun and looking sensational was a bitter pill. He soon began having serious second thoughts, though he realised that after the way he’d treated Catherine, it wasn’t going to be easy to woo her back.
This time, he knew, he’d have to give her cast-iron assurances about their future together. But how and when would he get the chance?
He didn’t have to wait long, thanks to a mutual friend. Sam Waley-Cohen, an amateur jockey, invited them individually to a ‘Freakin Naughty’ themed fancy-dress party at his family’s 17th-century manor house. The chemistry between William and Catherine did the rest.
She’d arrived dressed as a nurse and William had made a beeline for her. They then spent the first part of the evening deep in conversation before hitting the dance floor, where they ended up kissing. When friends joked they should get a room, they sloped off together.
At first, their reconciliation was kept secret. Then the Press noted that Catherine, seated two rows behind William at a charity pop concert for the tenth anniversary of Princess Diana’s death, had enthusiastically joined in the singing of Take That’s song Back For Good.
And so had the Prince. Pop songs, it would turn out, often held the key to the true state of their relationship.
That September, the couple enjoyed a romantic holiday together in the Seychelles, where they made a secret pact to marry at some point in the future.
In April 2008, William qualified as a pilot, then announced he’d be spending the next five years working as an RAF Search-and-Rescue pilot.
Carole Middleton, meanwhile, was reportedly growing anxious that her daughter’s on-off relationship had run its course.
Two years on, Catherine herself may have also been growing impatient. When William was posted to RAF Valley, Anglesey, she made it plain she wouldn’t be happy with a long-distance relationship.
They found a four-bedroom farmhouse house near his base and moved in together. Catherine, now working remotely as a web designer and photographer for her family’s firm, shopped at the local Waitrose and Morrisons and did most of the cooking.
She is not a vegetarian, but favoured meat-free dishes such as lentil curry and became an avid follower of cake recipes by Mary Berry.
Neither of them are big drinkers — William prefers a pint of cider over beer and Catherine’s aperitif of choice is just one gin and tonic — but they’d occasionally go out to the local pub.
Back then, they had no staff apart from a regular cleaner. Their Scotland Yard protection officers slept in the farmhouse’s converted outbuildings.
William later described their first real home together as an ‘immensely special place for us both’. His partner, however, admitted she sometimes felt a bit lonely. ‘It was so isolated, so cut off. I didn’t have my family around me, [and] he was doing night shifts.’
He finally proposed formally during a holiday in Kenyain 2010, by the side of the turquoise waters of Lake Alice. The question wasn’t entirely unexpected, of course, but Catherine’s face lit up with a radiant smile as she said yes.
Why had he waited so many years to propose, William was asked by Tom Bradby in the couple’s subsequent interview about their engagement.
‘I’m trying to learn from lessons done in the past,’ said Diana’s elder son. ‘I wanted to give her a chance to see in, and to back out if she needed to, before it all got too much.’
Catherine was going into the marriage with her eyes wide open. She’d experienced great highs and deep lows with her Prince during the years they’d been together, but she was now convinced their deep love for each other would endure.
For her bachelorette party night at a friend’s house, she donned a figure-hugging bodysuit and did a step-perfect impersonation of pop star Cheryl Cole singing her 2009 hit Fight For This Love. It’s an exuberant side to Catherine that William has always adored.
When he later met Cheryl Cole at the Diamond Jubilee concert, he told her: ‘Did you know you’ve got a bit of competition?’
On April 29, 2011, the couple married at Westminster Abbey — a day of pomp and ceremony watched by millions around the globe.
That evening, however, they had a surprise for friends at their late-night party in the Throne Room at Buckingham Palace.
As they stood grinning and holding hands in the middle of the room, the opening bars of the song You’re The One That I Want suddenly boomed out. To their friends’ delight, William and Catherine launched into the dance of the lead characters from the film, Grease, mouthing the words and pointing at each other.
It might have taken him eight years, but William had finally landed the one woman he truly wanted.
