‘Keep calm and carry on’: William and Kate learned Diana’s sad lessons, writes INGRID SEWARD

Catherine is hardly the first Princess of Wales to become the subject of overwhelming criticism.

The often fraught relationship between her late mother-in-law, Princess Diana, and the media must certainly have played a role in the Waleses’ cautious approach to details of family life.

Who can blame them?

Yet it is easy to forget that Diana’s dealings with the press had once been overwhelmingly positive.

In the early days of her courtship with Charles, journalists who spent time on the doorstep of her Kensington flat hoping for a few quick words were surprised to discover how friendly Diana was.

Perhaps, looking back, we can discover in such openness the beginnings of future problems. At the time, however, it was refreshing to see a potential member of the royal family seem so approachable.

Such was the enthusiasm for Diana – and the shortage of other supposedly suitable partners for a future monarch who was then in his thirties and had played on the field – that important questions were ignored.

Little attention was paid to the story of her unhappy childhood, or to the personal insecurity that continued to develop within her.

Years later, Diana confessed to me that in all her years as Princess of Wales, she had never become accustomed to the adoration of the public.

Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer looking delighted are pictured at Broadlands shortly after their engagement in March 1981

Diana, Princess of Wales, braves wet, stormy weather to meet the crowd waiting for her outside Capital Radio in London, in 1982

But the truth is that she sought Hollywood-style publicity and then discovered she couldn’t control it – and risked being consumed by it.

It’s a lesson her son William and Catherine will surely have learned.

We can see it in the determination to steer their own line through troubled waters. To address private issues on their own terms.

I applaud the Prince and Princess of Wales for trying to face the sewers of social media and retain some dignity. Correct.

This is what we expect from royals in the long run.

There can be no victory over the trolls who are willing to say and do anything, seemingly at no cost to themselves.

The Welsh are determined to avoid becoming characters in other people’s imaginations, says Ingrid Seward

The Princess of Wales makes a broadcast to the country in which she reveals a cancer diagnosis that ‘she had every right to keep private’

Kate meets the public during a walk after a visit to Aberavon, South Wales, in February 2023

Kate Middleton leaves her Chelsea home on her 25th birthday

William and Catherine have kept their heads down. They are the embodiment of the phrase ‘keep calm and carry on’.

Journalists and photographers are not the friends of the Welsh, as they were of Diana (at least some of them), but they are not enemies either.

Now that Catherine has revealed her cancer diagnosis to the nation in that emotional broadcast, she and her family appear to finally be enjoying some privacy.

As ‘deeply frustrated’ as William may be about the recent controversy, he has at least remained calm in public. His support was movingly acknowledged by Catherine in her video.

The Prince of Wales has continued his work where possible, allowing his office to come up with ideas for his wife’s public comeback, whenever that may be.

Kate and William have faced their difficulties in a friendly but distant way and moved on.

That’s what they’ve always done. It is as it should be.

• Ingrid Seward is editor-in-chief of Majesty Magazine. Her latest book is My Mother and I – the story of the king and our late queen. Published by Simon and Schuster. £25