Meghan Markle’s Childhood Friend Said She Was ‘Always Fascinated by the Royal Family’

They say once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever. A 9-year-old blog post from Meghan Markle’s deactivated website, The Tig, has resurfaced. In it, she rips Kate Middleton apart for following her “childish” fantasy of being a princess instead of a self-actualized woman. Did Meghan marry Harry out of an ironic twist of fate, or is she as devious as some have claimed?

Meghan Markle Had a Blog Called The Tig From 2014 to 2017

Meghan Markle ran The Tig from 2014 to 2017, deactivating it just months before her engagement to Prince Harry. It began as a “passion project” for the former Suits actress but evolved into a full-time job. Suits director Silver Tree revealed in the Harry and Meghan Netflix docuseries how Meghan had initially described her blog.

“When she first was describing [the blog] to me, she was like, ‘It’s like your best friend telling you all the fun things you wish you knew about in one place,’” said Tree. Basically, a gossip column.

Despite speculation that she put her blog aside at the request of the Royal family, an insider told People at the time that it was simply so she could focus on Suits as well as new philanthropic projects.

The Tig, named after Markle’s favorite red wine, Tignanello, covered a variety of subjects including food, travel, and lifestyle. And every now and then, Meghan would engage in some all-out female bashing. It’s a stark turnaround from her current podcast, Archetypes, which seeks to “investigate, dissect, and subvert the labels that try to hold women back.”

Meghan Ragged on Kate Middleton as a Weakling Who’d Indulged in a “Childhood Fantasy”

The 2014 blog post, which was intensely focused on Kate Middleton’s 2011 wedding to Prince William, essentially put many of those labels that Meghan so vehemently opposes onto Kate. Markle described her as a stereotypical woman holding onto stereotypical girlish fantasies of being a damsel who gets rescued by her rich prince. Daily Mail resurfaced the post, and let’s just say that this doesn’t look good for Markle, who made a lot of comparisons while tearing her now sister-in-law down.

“Little girls dream of being princesses. I, for one, was all about She-Ra, Princess of Power,” wrote Markle. “For those of you unfamiliar with the ’80s cartoon reference, She-Ra is the twin sister of He-Man and a sword-wielding royal rebel known for her strength. We’re definitely not talking about Cinderella here.”

“Grown women seem to retain this childhood fantasy. Just look at the pomp and circumstance surrounding the royal wedding and endless conversation about Princess Kate,” she continued.

Ouch!

The Blog Posts Were Removed 3 Months Before Meghan and Harry’s Engagement

Three years later, The Tig came down. All the blog posts were replaced with a goodbye letter from Markle, who reminded her readers to never “forget your worth.”

Then came the announcement that she was engaged to Prince Harry. Page Six reported that Markle said she “didn’t know much” about her fiancé or his family prior to hopping into a relationship with him.

“Because I’m from the States, you don’t grow up with the same understanding of the royal family,” said Meghan, standing next to Harry. “And so, while I now understand very clearly there is a global interest there, I didn’t know much about him, and so the only thing that I had asked [a friend] when she said she wanted to set us up was, I have one question: ‘Well, is he nice?’ Because if he wasn’t kind, it just didn’t seem like it would make sense.”

It’s Hard to Believe That Meghan Markle Didn’t Pay Attention to Prince Harry or the Royal Family Growing Up

It’s difficult to ascertain how true this claim was, of not knowing anything about Prince Harry. Many Millennials from the United States grew up seeing photos of the cute redheaded prince and his older brother on magazine stands. Hopeful mothers around the world have been known to dish that “princess fantasy” onto their growing daughters, perhaps with the hope that one day they can retire into luxury as their special little one deals with the tabloids. I’m speaking from experience here.

Markle’s Childhood Friend Said She Was “Always Fascinated by the Royal Family”

Just after Meghan made the claim that she had no idea what Prince Harry was like or anything about him, her childhood friend Ninaki Priddy shared an old photo with Daily Mail. It was of her and Meghan sitting on a railing in front of Buckingham Palace, aged 15, in 1996. Priddy claimed that Meghan may have been “planning this all her life,” and was “always fascinated by the Royal Family.”

“I’m not shocked at all,” Priddy told the outlet. “It’s like she has been planning this all her life. She gets exactly what she wants, and Harry has fallen for her play. She was always fascinated by the Royal Family. She wants to be Princess Diana 2.0. She will play her role ably, but my advice to him is to tread cautiously.”

Who’s Cinderella Story Is Better, Kate or Meghan’s?

Wanting to be Princess Diana 2.0 isn’t quite the same as the leggy, helmeted, sword-wielding She-Ra. Some could argue that Diana spearheaded a new kind of independence, especially for women, within the Royal Family. But she was still thrust into a life of glamor, luxury, and public spectacle. Like any Disney fairytale, Diana’s place in the world was coveted by billions of people, who could only dream of one day filling her shoes. How is Meghan any different from Kate in this story?

Some Are Speculating That Meghan Might Reactivate The Tig

Now that this bizarre saga has played out, it’s possible that Meghan may actually reactivate The Tig website. Daily Mail reported a few months ago that the Duchess had recently applied for a trademark for the blog, which usually only means one thing: an intention to continue using the name in commerce.

Meghan also spoke about her blog in her six-part Netflix docuseries.

“I’ve never really been the type of person to do only one thing, I guess that’s how my website was born,” she said in episode two. “There was fashion, tons of food, and travel — all the things that I loved. The Tig wasn’t just a hobby, it became a really successful business.”

This was the second time that Markle reportedly filed for the trademark. The first filing was in 2019. But at the time, her representative said it was more of a defense filing than anything else.

“The lasting trademark is to prevent false branding, to avoid others purporting to be the Duchess or affiliated with her,” said her rep.

Read More: Meghan Markle’s Half-Sister to Refile Defamation Case with Even Stronger Evidence