Prince Harry Shares How Meghan Markle Met the Royal Family

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Prince Harry Reveals How Meghan Markle Met Each Member of the Royal Family: Queen Elizabeth II, Prince William and More

During Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s early courtship, the Suits alum had a tall order ahead of her as meeting her boyfriend’s family also meant meeting the royals.

“It was all very pleasant,” the Duke of Sussex recalled of Meghan’s first meeting with Queen Elizabeth II in October 2016.

Harry and the “Archetypes” podcast host began dating that July before he drove her to the queen’s Royal Lodge in Windsor, England, for lunch. The twosome — who wed in May 2018 — were joined by Elizabeth, Prince Andrew, Sarah Ferguson, Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank.

Her Majesty — who died in September 2022 at the age of 96 — wanted to ask the California native about her opinion of former President Donald Trump’s first political campaign, Harry wrote in his 2023 memoir, Spare. Meghan, for her part, thought getting into a political conversation was a “no-win game,” and seemingly changed the subject to talk about her residence in Canada. (Meghan lived in Toronto while she filmed Suits.)

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“Granny looked pleased. ‘Commonwealth. Good, fine,’” the Invictus Games cofounder recalled in his debut memoir, which hits shelves in January 2023, before noting that Elizabeth revealed her departure plans 20 minutes later. As the queen took the Duke of York’s arm to leave the room, she apparently turned back to say goodbye to her guests. “She locked eyes with Meg, gave a wave and a warm smile. ‘Bye,’” Harry wrote.

While Meghan impressed the long-reigning monarch during their first lunch, she “freaked out” Harry’s older brother, Prince William, by giving him a hug when they met face-to-face, the Invictus Games cofounder wrote in his book.

“He recoiled. Willy didn’t hug many strangers. Whereas Meg hugged most strangers,” Harry claimed, revealing that the Duke of Cornwall and wife Princess Kate had been “religious” viewers of Suits.

Meghan, for her part, previously recalled in Netflix’s 2022 docuseries Harry & Meghan that she met the Cambridges during an intimate Kensington Palace dinner.

“They came over for dinner, and I remember I was in ripped jeans and I was barefoot,” the Bench author said in the docuseries, which premiered in December 2022, before claiming Kate was caught off guard by her greeting. “I was a hugger. I’ve always been a hugger. I didn’t realize that is really jarring for a lot of Brits.”

She continued: “I guess I started to understand very quickly that the formality on the outside carried through on the inside, that there is a forward-facing way of being, and then you close the door and you go, ‘Oh, alright, OK, I can relax now.’ But that formality carries over on both sides, and that was surprising to me.”

Scroll below to read Harry’s account of introducing Meghan to the royals:

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Queen Elizabeth II

Harry invited Meghan to meet his beloved grandmother after she returned home from that morning’s church service. “Fun, I love grandmas,” he recalled his now-wife saying.

As the twosome greeted the queen, Harry noticed that Meghan had dropped into a “deep, flawless curtsy” and said, “Your Majesty. Pleasure to meet you.”

While Elizabeth was dressed for church, Harry and Meghan wore “shabby” jeans, which the Spare author admittedly regretted.

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King Charles III and Queen Consort Camilla

Harry wrote that he and “Meg” had rehearsed how to greet Charles and Camilla before their official meeting. The former actress had practiced curtsying to His Majesty and only planned to give him a kiss on the cheek if he leaned in first. Harry had also instructed Meghan not to curtsy to his stepmother per protocol, instead offering either a cheek kiss or a handshake.

After the proper greetings, the British monarch — who ascended the throne in September 2022 after Elizabeth’s death — asked Meghan if she was “the star of an American soap opera,” Harry recalled.

“She smiled. I smiled. I desperately wanted to say, ‘Soap opera? No, that’s our family, Pa,’” Harry quipped, before the Northwestern University alum explained that Suits was a cable drama series about lawyers that aired in the evenings. Charles reportedly replied, “Marvelous. How splendid.”

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Prince William and Princess Kate

While Harry prepped Meghan to formally greet Elizabeth and his father according to their titles, he saw William and Kate as just his brother “Willy” and his wife “who loved Suits.”

Following Harry’s instruction, Meghan gave William and Kate a pair of hugs, which notably caught the twosome off guard.

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Sarah Ferguson

Ferguson’s youngest daughter, Eugenie, was the first royal relative that Meghan met, alongside Brooksbank, when they visited the duo in Canada. The next “logical” step was to introduce Meghan to the former Duchess of York. The former Tig blogger attempted to curtsy to Ferguson outside the Royal Lodge in 2016. When it became clear that she did not know how to perform one, the Her Heart for a Compass author gave an impromptu tutorial. Meghan then flawlessly mimicked Ferguson’s actions, Harry penned in Spare.

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Prince Andrew

After the queen’s hasty exit from their first meeting, Meghan asked Harry about the assistant that had been “holding her purse” during the meal. The duke then explained it was Andrew, Elizabeth and the late Prince Philip’s second son. “She definitely hadn’t Googled us,” Harry wrote.