Lady Helen Marina Lucy Windsor was born on 28 April 1964 at
Coppins, a country house in
Iver,
Buckinghamshire, the only daughter of the
Duke and
Duchess of Kent. She was christened on 6 June in the private chapel at
Windsor Castle by the
Dean of Windsor Rt. Rev.
Robin Woods. Her godparents were
Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon; Hon.
Angus Ogilvy,
Myra Butter, and Sir Philip Hay. She was educated at Eton End School in
Datchet, then at
St Mary's School, Wantage, and
Gordonstoun. At Gordonstoun, she was one of 20
sixth form girls "in the robustly masculine environment of Gordonstoun," wrote Alan Hamilton. She was called "Melons" in the popular press. I was slightly chubby, it was the boys at Gordonstoun who called me that. I think there are only about two people who call me that now. The original context has long gone. During the 1980s, her boyfriend was
Nigel Oakes, who "appalled the Queen" after she smuggled him into her parents'
grace-and-favour home,
York House, St James's Palace. According to
Lol Tolhurst of
The Cure, Helen was a "mad Cure fan" who visited the band backstage at a gig in
Bath in 1983. ==Career==