A piano teacher, a classmate and a royal windfall

But the UK government these days is failing the climate challenge

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‘Queen Prima Donna at Home’, for "Punch," Nov. 7, 1874, by George Du Maurier, 1874. Image courtesy of The Met.

I have two (very tenuous) links to Britain’s royal family. First, I shared a piano teacher with Princess Diana. Yes, the first wife of King Charles III went to school in my town in Kent, England, and, like my parents, employed a certain Miss Lily Snipp to help her tinkle the ivories. Later, as related by biographer Andrew Morton, Lady Di invited said Snipp to Buckingham Palace to continue her lessons.

The other connection was Timothy Laurence, a classmate at my high school, who went on to marry Charles’ sister, Princess Anne. Would he remember me? Probably — our graduating class numbered only about 100.

And now I learn that I have an even more tenuous link. Which is that I write (sometimes) about offshore wind power and that the Crown Estate — the royal property manager — has just earned record profits from same.