I actually had lunch with the Queen Mother. It was in 1991, I think, at the Grand National. I was invited up by Peter Greenall who had a box. The one thing that I remember was how short she was. Actually if you are going to make allusions to fictional characters, the one she reminded me most of was Paddington Bear. After lunch, I remember the Queen Mother lost a gold pencil and me and Emma Freud and the ex foreign minister under Thatcher and a few other notables were scrambling on our hands and knees to try and find this pencil.
She spoke to me once of twice and when i responded, she asked where I was from. She said with a smile, are you an American? I said no I was Canadian and she said oh excuse me but I love Canada. And she told me about a state visit she had made there before the war. Before we all left, she came up to me once more and said I hope you will forgive me, I thought you were American. She was very humble and it was a nice afternoon.
