Princess Margaret had a sommelier’s nose for sycophants and could reduce the powerful to a damp wreck…but she loved nothing better than dancing to reggae, writes SUSANNAH CONSTANTINE (who used to date her son!)

It was neither ladylike nor regal. 

But Susannah Constantine’s latest revelation that Princess Margaret loved ‘snooping round folks’s homes’ on the Caribbean island of Mustique didn’t  come as a whole shock to those that knew her greatest.

Regardless of her famously imperious method, Queen Elizabeth’s sister was  a free spirit, a royal rule breaker whose life, though marked by unhappiness, was one in every of nice vitality and color.

TV presenter and creator Susannah actually did know the princess  due to a six-year relationship with Margaret’s son David, Viscount Linley, now the Earl of Snowdon.

And she or he gave her personal compelling account of the  princess behind closed doorways in her memoir, Prepared for Completely Nothing.

Right here, in an extract first revealed by the Day by day Mail in September 2022, Susannah remembers the princess as girl of big heat – and surprisingly few inhibitions… 

By Susannah Constantine

My childhood, break up between Kensington in West London and our rented nation home on the property of Belvoir Citadel in Lincolnshire, was distinctly privileged, although one thing of a gilded cage for ladies.

The principles of my class meant the one factor I used to be ready for by the point I obtained to 21, in 1983, was marriage to an appropriate mate. And as luck would have it, I would met one solely the week earlier than.

It was the connection that will outline my 20s, and but essentially the most vital a part of the equation, it turned out, was not my boyfriend however his mom — HRH Princess Margaret.

Assembly her son, David Linley was like bagging the star prize at a elaborate tombola. In my Sloaney world you did not get a lot greater than a viscount, particularly one who additionally occurred to be the Queen’s nephew.

He appeared one night time — the pal of a pal — at a cocktail party I threw at our home in Cottesmore Gardens, and I reeled him in with my signature pasta pesto bake and banana break up chaser. By the point I met his mom, we had been relationship for 3 months.

In fact, I knew her by fame and had an expectation of what she’d be like, however I by no means imagined we would develop the type of relationship we finally did.

Princess Margaret taught me many issues, however essentially the most helpful was the necessity to know your self and to believe to face by your personal opinions.

She gave me the braveness to be myself, as a result of that is precisely what she all the time was. She was not often impartial and by no means boring.

Although she was not in the identical place as her elder sister, Elizabeth, hers was no much less a lifetime of service. The one actual distinction was that whereas the Queen gave herself to Crown and Nation, Princess Margaret — by then divorced from David’s father, the Earl of Snowdon — gave herself to her sister as pal and confidante for near half a century.

Regardless of these duties, the princess all the time stored one foot in ‘regular’ life, and what I cherished was her skill to tread the positive line between naughtiness and the tasks of a senior royal.

At our first assembly, it rapidly turned clear I used to be being examined. How I responded to her imperious greeting would set the tone for the remainder of our relationship. Would I bow down and curl up in a ball at her ft or meet her head on with bravado and hope for one of the best?

I selected the latter. I stood my floor and my gamble paid off. To my shock, she opened her arms and her embrace felt like the nice and cozy feathers of a mom hen. I arrived tough and prepared, and she or he clucked round me protectively.

It was a beautiful feeling and one I hadn’t identified I wanted. To the surface world, Princess Margaret was usually seen because the unhappy, lonely, barbed sister of our monarch. Some mentioned she loved humiliating folks; that she used her royal standing like a sabre to chop these she did not belief or like.

Definitely, she did not endure fools. She had a sommelier’s nostril for sycophants and will scale back even essentially the most highly effective to a humid wreck. However all this was a type of safety. As soon as she knew your motives weren’t self-serving, there was no kinder, funnier, extra loyal ally available.

Each David and I had been dwelling at dwelling once we obtained collectively, and there was by no means a query of him staying over at ours. My mother and father had been of the view that good women did not sleep with their boyfriends. At Kensington Palace, Princess Margaret was extra open-minded and, as long as we had been discreet, turned a blind eye to us sloping off collectively on the finish of the night time.

Everybody knew she cherished a drink and a fag, however few had the pleasure of seeing her dance round to Desmond Dekker’s Israelites in her drawing room. If there was one factor she guarded along with her life, it was the correct to play DJ when internet hosting at Kensington Palace. That was the factor about Princess Margaret; she lived her whole life in entrance of an viewers, however all the time managed to carve out a distinct segment — non-public corners — the place she could possibly be herself.

The best instance of this was Les Jolies Eaux, her dwelling on the island of Mustique within the Caribbean. My holidays there along with her and David had been once we obtained to spend most time collectively.

Within the very early days it was the closest factor you’d get to a desert island. An eccentric little commune, reduce off from the remainder of the world. There have been no direct flights to Mustique, so to get there we would fly to Barbados and cease in a single day on the British Consul.

Our fundamental concern on the island was whether or not or not we would get an honest breakfast. As a precaution, half my suitcase was filled with smoked salmon, Lincolnshire sausages, marmalade, Marmite and bacon on the request of the princess. If she taught me something it was that the part components of a full English should be neither compromised nor left to likelihood.

Her fabulous, filthy giggle was the soundtrack to many a cheerful vacation along with her and David. Similar to her mom earlier than her, in on a regular basis I knew the princess, I by no means as soon as noticed her in trousers. I noticed her in a swimsuit many instances, however by no means ever trousers.

The swimsuits had been the corseted variety, strapless to make sure a fair tan. She knew the strengths and weaknesses of her determine and the way to take advantage of the previous.

A bikini was out of the query. Like all girls of her era, the emphasis when swimming was on holding one’s hair dry, which was why she all the time swam breaststroke, hovering nearly upright and propelling herself by way of the water with tiny hand actions like slightly otter.

She by no means burned and the key of that, I appear to recollect, was a full face of make-up and Lancaster solar cream. Having mentioned that, the one time she actually spent out of the shade was on our post-lunch strolls down the seashore. Her completely manicured toes would poke by way of the sand with their deep coral varnish; her fingers and lips matching.

Her ankles and calves had been tiny; birdlike nearly. At 5ft 1in she appeared terribly petite to me. I felt like a lolloper subsequent to her.

But it surely was her grit and resourcefulness I most revered. If we would arrived within the early days of Mustique, she’d have been the primary individual to construct a bonfire, though she’d in all probability have made me go and accumulate the wooden. She was nothing if not sensible. What I am attempting to say is, there was a deep sense of loyalty between us. Even after David and I separated, it by no means light.

In 1994, 5 years after I would break up from her son, she instantly popped again up on my radar. One way or the other or different she’d realized of my upcoming nuptials and wished to host an engagement dinner for my fiance, Sten, and I on the ultra-discreet Blakes Resort in South Kensington. She knew she’d want to carry the dinner someplace non-public as a result of the Press would have had a subject day had they discovered the princess serenading her son’s ex and her new beau.

Personally, I doubt she’d have cared, however she knew when a scenario required cautious dealing with. Actually, she stored it so secret, the dinner got here as a whole shock to David once I talked about it to him final month on the phone.

We each agreed that had his mom not been a senior royal, she’d have made a wonderful secret service agent.

In writing my memoir, I spent many hours fondly remembering Princess Margaret and I realise the guide is partly a love letter to a lady I thought of for a few years the closest factor I needed to a surrogate mom.

As youngsters we start shifting away from childhood and its safety.

Once we hit our 20s, I feel the relationships we make are a midway home between the comforts of childhood and the freedoms of maturity. Because of this, we regularly connect ourselves not simply to our companions however their households — looking for a alternative for the mother and father we would blithely solid apart a number of years earlier than.

I would flown the nest and was on the lookout for someplace new to relaxation my head and sleep safely. For me, this was the house of my boyfriend’s mom. That she was a princess was neither right here nor there.

This is not an unusual dynamic, I feel — however I think I wanted a way of safety greater than most. My very own mom’s psychological well being had lengthy been poor and our relationship was fragile all through my teenagers.

Once I met David, Mum’s bipolar dysfunction was at its peak. She was ravaged by it. Determined, chaotic answering machine messages blended with psychotic episodes and a number of suicide makes an attempt, and all of the whereas my father remained in denial — at the very least outwardly. Buddies knew she was unwell, however it was an unstated rule to deal with the whole lot as if it had been regular.

This meant there was nobody to show to when issues had been tough at dwelling. Even now I discover it troublesome to open up. I feel deep down I’ve all the time frightened I will be the identical as my mum; that I am going to fall down the identical gap. That if I expose my weak point I will be labelled in the identical method she’d been — as a lady who could not deal with life somewhat than as somebody who was in poor health.

I cherished my mom dearly, however I couldn’t depend on her, and I ponder now, had I had a extra secure maternal affect in my life, whether or not Princess Margaret would have been as protecting of me as she was. I feel the mom in her noticed I wanted assist.

I would been doing my greatest to paper over the cracks, however she instinctively noticed previous my facade. As a young person and younger girl I would felt answerable for my mom, particularly when she was consuming. All through my childhood I would by no means had the safety to collapse in instances of emotional stress. Once I met Princess Margaret, she made me really feel protected and, consequently, I felt extra capable of open up.

It was an extended highway for me and one with many twists and turns, however I truthfully consider that with out her, I’ll not even have ventured on to the correct path in any respect.

Previously I all the time felt the have to be robust; all the time up, by no means down or depressed. Like my father, a number of the time I’ve introduced what I contemplate to be the right model of myself: resilient, succesful, with out weak point.

When my mom was in poor health, I stored her at arm’s size emotionally as a result of the considered the choice was overwhelming — as if I would drown if the floodgates had been allowed to open.

Princess Margaret was one in every of only a few individuals who handled my mum as an equal. She did not patronise or look down on her, even when she was at her worst.

Their first assembly was nearly comical. For some motive, the princess settled on the plan of going to each properties in a single night time, like a pub crawl. Drinks at ours; dinner on the Palace. This might have been her need to make my mother and father really feel vital and comfy, however I feel it extra doubtless she simply wished the possibility to nostril spherical their home.

Assembly the ‘in-laws’ (we weren’t engaged, however that is what it felt like) is nerve-racking at one of the best of instances, however when one in every of them is a princess it provides an additional layer of strain. My mom was on an almighty excessive that night time and, although she was at dwelling across the aristocracy, started a night of compulsive curtseying the minute our friends arrived.

It was troublesome to take care of the move of dialog provided that my mum dropped midway to the ground each time Princess Margaret a lot as blinked. Dad went the opposite method altogether, and in an effort to show we had been pretty much as good as she was, adopted a relaxed, Dave Allen method.

Thank God David and I did not get married. I do not suppose my poor mother and father might have withstood the strain.

It took me a very long time to return to phrases with mum’s melancholy. However seeing the way in which Princess Margaret handled her made me realise that my mom and her sickness had been two separate issues. Mum was nonetheless in there; I simply wanted to know the way to discover her once more — and, finally, I did.

Even now, I’m tremendously moved by Princess Margaret’s emotional generosity in direction of me. I didn’t know the way a lot I wanted a lady like her in my life on the time, however she did.

Exterior her personal youngsters I had one thing only a few folks can declare to have skilled — the heat of Princess Margaret’s softer, maternal aspect; and for that I might be for ever grateful.

• Prepared For Completely Nothing, by Susannah Constantine is revealed by Penguin Michael Joseph