AMANDA PLATELL: With Kate away, Meghan seized her chance to look like the perfect wholesome ‘mompreneur’ … then the REAL Royal mummy returned and had the last word

Poor Meghan. After meticulously planning for what must have been months, if not years, the Duchess of Sussex relaunched herself as the perfect, healthy stay-at-home royal mother of two last week through her new lifestyle blog American Riviera Orchard.

Of course, her timing couldn’t have been better, as that other royal mother, Kate, was invisible.

But just days after Meg’s vision for her new umbrella company, Mama Knows Best, was revealed to the world via a slick video, which sees her dressed in white in a sparkling fairytale princess kitchen, Real Royal mummy returned.

Yes, in the midst of Meghan’s reinvention, at a time when she must have imagined herself making headlines, that video of Kate and William appeared in their local farm shop in Windsor.

Kate looked smiling, happy, even jumpy. Despite all the speculation about her health, she was clearly alive and well here.

The video went viral, making headlines around the world and laying a lie to social media doubters and conspiracy theorists with their increasingly outrageous and distasteful posts.

The Duchess of Sussex (pictured with Prince Harry) relaunched herself as the perfect, healthy stay-at-home royal mother of two via her new lifestyle blog American Riviera Orchard

Kate looked thinner – who wouldn’t after abdominal surgery? – but she looked the picture of contentment in a sports top and leggings: an ordinary mother going on a weekend shopping trip with her husband.

There was also no doubt about the video’s origins. The photo was taken by fellow shopper Nelson Silva, who saw Kate and William in the bread section of the Windsor Farm Shop on Saturday. He filmed them on his iPhone as they left the shop, just a mile from their home, Adelaide Cottage, on the Windsor Castle estate. To prove its authenticity, the video contained exact details about the date, time and place it was recorded.

And who was the world more obsessed with? Not Meghan and her marmalade and jam, or fancy knives and forks, or mugs and tablecloths, but Kate and her well-being.

The global headlines weren’t about Meghan’s oh-so carefully chosen trinkets, but about Kate’s smile, which cost nothing.

Perhaps the smart, calculating Meghan believed that her new mother blog would overshadow the royal psychodrama – with the King being ill, the Queen fighting on, the general despondency of the Prince of Wales and his wife recovering from surgery in the middle of a Mother’s Day celebration. fed up. photoshop ‘scandal’ – allowing her to shine in the extremely convenient void left behind.

She might have thought that news of her new Martha Stewart-style venture – expected to make her millions – coming just minutes before Prince William spoke movingly at the Diana Legacy Awards in London a week ago, his appearance in the would leave a shadow.

Was she really unaware of how opportunistic this could look?

William and Kate’s public trust factor has risen ten and nine points respectively to 49 percent each, even ahead of the King and Queen

Then, in a second act that some say could be a hijacking of the spotlight, Harry and Meghan announced the winner of their $100,000 Archewell Foundation Digital Civil Rights Award while William was still on stage at the Diana Awards.

Any cynic might think that these self-styled humanitarians were in fact money-grabbing chisels.

Or, as their former Spotify boss famously described them after their multi-million pound deal collapsed thanks to their ‘disappointing’ content, a few ‘grifters’ (a term roughly translated from American to English as ‘scammers’ ).

Make no bones about it, this has been a bad week for the Sussexes. But as events have proven, they are quickly losing what is left of the love and respect of the British public.

This was also the week that Harry and Meghan were demoted from the official Buckingham Palace website, their hagiographies reduced from many thousands of words to just hundreds, and relegated to the bottom of the page, sharing an invoice along with the disgraced Prince Andrew – now just a footnote in the royal hierarchy.

Meghan’s entry describes her as a former actress who ran a website, and includes details of her charitable activities during her short time as a working royal.

Harry’s includes a few words about his birth and upbringing, his time in the armed forces, and the Invictus Games for wounded and injured military personnel that he founded (undoubtedly a worthwhile endeavor).

But things were about to get worse when a Mail poll revealed that barely 17 percent of Britons trust a single word that comes out of Meghan’s mouth, and that only 22 percent of us believe or trust Prince Harry, while both William and Kate’s trust factor has increased ten and nine points respectively to 49 percent, even ahead of the King and Queen.

Not exactly the ideal backdrop for Meghan’s launch as a new mompreneur.

Perhaps Kate, the sister-in-law whom she and Harry so denigrated in his book Spare and during the interview with Oprah – when she was accused of making a vulnerable Meghan cry over a bridesmaid’s dress – is actually the one who had the last word.

Without saying a single word.