Hollywood has primed her for star part in firm

WHEN Lady Diana Spencer felt claustrophobic about her life she would get into her Mini Metro, put some favourite classical music on the cassette player and drive off at full speed. She once told me that the moment she realised she was a prisoner of her circumstances was when she was staying at Buckingham Palace prior to her marriage and was desperate to get out into the real world. She took the lift from the old nursery floor to the Privy Purse entrance and got into her car parked in the courtyard. Just as she put the key in the ignition a burly detective got in beside her. “I am quite fine,” she told him. “I am just going for a drive.” “M’lady,” he said, “You are about to be part of the Royal Family and I have been assigned to protect you.” The realisation that never again would she be able to be a free person was a shock to the young Diana. It was a wake-up call to the life she was about to enter. “It’s too late, Dutch,” her sisters told her, using their favourite childhood name for their sister. “Your face is on the tea towels.” But that was almost 40 years ago. Today Meghan Markle, an independent, strong American woman of 36, is about to enter the ivory tower of royalty. She can have no real idea of what it entails and if she did she might have some serious doubts. But her love for new husband Haz, as she calls him, has almost certainly blinded her to the reality of the life ahead of her. The late Prince William of Gloucester, a cousin of the Queen who would have been a great uncle to Prince Harry, once remarked: “It is almost impossible to describe what it is like being a member of the Royal Family. I