How Prince William Realized Kate Middleton Was Perfect Queen Material

While Tim Graham and Peter Archer were writing the 2003 biography William, they included that friends were saying that Will and Kate were not romantic, just mates. And William himself declared during an interview coinciding with his 21st birthday that June that he was single.

“If I fancy a girl and she fancies me back, which is rare, I ask her out,” he explained. “But at the same time I don’t want to put them in an awkward situation, because a lot of people don’t understand what comes with knowing me, for one—and secondly, if they were my girlfriend, the excitement it would probably cause.”

But they were taking their chances.

Per Nicholl, a 2002 game of “I’ve Never” turned awkward when William, Kate and Carly—who ended up living across the road from them—all ended up at a dinner party and Carly offered, “I’ve never dated two people in this room,” knowing that Will was by then dating Kate and, if he was being truthful, would have to take a shot—signaling that he had dated two people in the room.

Kate, already not a big fan, was done with Carly after that.