Reporting for duty in a role once earmarked for his younger brother, the Prince of Wales made a light-hearted joke about spending time with family being a "mixed bag".
Dashing in combat uniform and a beret, the heir to the throne was speaking to soldiers as colonel-in-chief of the Army Air Corps, on his first visit to Wattisham Airfield in Suffolk since taking on the title last year.
The position is one that royal insiders once believed would fall to Prince Harry when his father Charles became King. He would have been a natural fit for the job with his former unit at the airbase where he trained as an Apache pilot from 2011, had he not left royal duties behind for a new life in the US.
Instead, it has fallen to Prince William to step up to support the unit, and he spent time last week observing training drills, touring the facilities and even serving up bacon rolls for military families before piloting himself home in a Wildcat helicopter.
© Kensington PalaceAsking about the pace of life and how often the troops saw their loved ones, he joked: "Some of them might not want to see you that much. It's a mixed bag."
Although his comments related to the ups and downs of military life, they could not have been more prescient, given the way the day was to unfold. William's outing coincided with his niece Princess Lilibet’s fourth birthday, which was marked by an unprecedented flurry of social media posts by the Duchess of Sussex.
© Instagram / @meghanThey included private photographs of Meghan cradling a newborn Lilibet and cuddling her more recently, followed by two images of the Duke gazing into his baby daughter's eyes and walking barefoot and hand-in-hand with her down a sandy path.
© InstagramBut it was the final post – a video clip more than a minute long – that underlined the stark contrast in the way the once-close royal brothers are now living their lives.
The clip shows a heavily pregnant Meghan twerking alongside Harry in their hospital room as she prepares to give birth to Lilibet. It was met with astonishment among long-time royal watchers.
© Instagram / @meghan"The contrast between these images of the two brothers is huge: one of service and one of just silliness, really," royal author Robert Jobson tells HELLO!. "What Harry and Meghan shared is great for clickbait, but not very good for anything else.
"William takes his responsibilities to the institution, to his father, to his family, very seriously. You see that in the way he looks and the way he acts. He has grown into the role of supporting his father and being a King in waiting."
Since he became Prince of Wales in 2022, William has built up his experience as a global figure and is expected to play a key diplomatic role when French President Emmanuel Macron visits the UK next month and when President Donald Trump arrives in September for his second state visit.
On the global stage
Last weekend, the Prince addressed world leaders on the urgent need to protect the oceans at the Blue Economy and Finance Forum in Monaco, saying: "Halfway through this decisive decade, I call on all of you to think big in your actions. Let us act together with urgency and optimism while we still have the chance."
He also joined forces with Sir David Attenborough to highlight the issue in a short film.
© Ryan Jenkinson / Kensington PalaceAnd after what he described as a "brutal" 2024, during which both his wife the Princess and his father the King faced treatment for cancer, William has been increasingly visible in recent months, setting out the direction of travel for his passion projects and the way he wants to use his platform.
He has chosen to give himself challenging and time-limited goals: five years to prove that it is possible to end homelessness through his Homewards initiative, and a decade to find 50 solutions to some of the world's biggest environmental problems via the Earthshot Prize.
The Prince wants to make the biggest impact he can while he is in his current role; when he becomes King, his freedom to act will necessarily be curtailed. And although he may once have envisaged his reign as one in which his brother Harry would play a key supporting role, he will need to rely on others instead.
© Getty ImagesAmong them is the Duchess of Edinburgh, who has long been an unsung hero of the royal family and who joined the Prince for a rare joint outing to the Royal Cornwall Show last week.
Securing the future
"It's all about William now, and him preparing Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis for their future roles in the next decade or so," says Robert, author of Catherine: Princess of Wales.
"I do think that the idea of Harry ever coming back and doing anything constructive for the royal family is pretty much over. Not because of the twerking, but because there's too much water under the bridge. Too many things have gone on that would be difficult to erase from the memory."
Amid the Duchess's multiple social-media posts last week, it also emerged that Meghan and Harry had looked into changing their surname to Spencer when the issuing of Archie and Lilibet's passports was repeatedly delayed.
© InstagramThe couple reportedly waited almost six months for the documents to arrive, leading them to believe that the application may have been "blocked" because they were using the children's HRH titles; Harry and Meghan had started using Prince and Princess for Archie and Lilibet after their daughter's christening in 2023, following correspondence with the King. Archie had previously been known by the royal family's surname, Mountbatten-Windsor.
In 2020, Queen Elizabeth II decided that Harry and Meghan could no longer use their HRH titles once they ceased to be working royals. HELLO! understands that Harry contacted Earl Spencer to discuss the possibility of using Spencer as the family's surname, if the applications were blocked. The passports were eventually issued after lawyers for the Duke and Duchess sent a letter threatening to pursue a data subject access request.
Seeking a fresh start
With royal life now seemingly far behind him, Harry appears to be searching for more purpose. Bruised by a recent High Court defeat over his security provision in the UK and a very public row with the chief executive of Sentebale, after which he and the board of trustees resigned from the charity he co-founded in memory of his mother Diana, Princess of Wales, he is ploughing a separate professional furrow to that of his wife.
In recent months, she has launched her As Ever product line, a new podcast called Confessions of a Female Founder and her Netflix lifestyle series With Love, Meghan.
© COURTESY OF NETFLIXThe couple's $100m (£74m) deal with the streaming service is due to end this year, and reports vary as to whether it will be renewed, cancelled or realigned to concentrate solely on Meghan. She remains focused on As Ever, and a second series of With Love, Meghan is due to air later this year.
Yet last week, confusing messages emerged about the future availability of As Ever's products Following the first roll-out of goods, including jam, tea and flower sprinkles, which sold out immediately, Meghan said that future releases were being put "on pause". However, hours later, she wrote on Instagram that a restock was coming later this month.
Access all areas
PR and media consultant Mark Borkowski believes that the couple's busy social-media strategy, including the unprecedented twerking video, is a way to keep themselves in the spotlight.
"I think that, particularly in America and with the way the media is consumed, it is about not being out of the headlines," he tells us. "They know that if they can keep the spotlight, there's always a business deal, because if you're launching something, you need attention. They have to generate money; they have, undoubtedly, a very expensive lifestyle.
"Any noise that's created around them gets eyeballs: that's data, that's clicks, that's money. I think what Meghan and Harry have done is to unconsciously create a live 24/7 soap opera. It's not far away from the Kardashian brand.
He adds: "The person who gets forgotten about is Harry: this is the Meghan show. Here is a man built for purpose and service and, in my eyes, there is a sense that he is a very different kind of spare now."
Pick up the latest issue of HELLO! on sale in the UK now. You can subscribe to HELLO! to get the magazine delivered free to your door every week or purchase the digital edition online via our Apple or Google apps.
