When Harry first really met Meghan - ADAM HELLIKER

The couple’s coyness fuelled speculation over the royal cupid’s identity, with the credit going to Meghan’s chum Jessica Mulroney, designer Misah Nonoo, Soho House’s Canadian consultant Markus Anderson, or Harry’s friend Violet von Westenholz.

Now I’m told by a close friend of Miss Westenholz’s family: “It was definitely Violet. Not that she would ever boast about it but she’s quietly pleased that Harry and Meghan have ended up so happy together.”

The introduction was made in July 2016 when Meghan was in London doing promotional work for Ralph Lauren, for which Violet, 33, is employed as a PR.

Violet is one of Harry’s long-standing platonic girlfriends since the days when she used to join the young princes on ski trips to Switzerland – her father Piers von Westenholz is a former Olympic skier and a close friend of Prince Charles.

I’m told: “Violet and Meghan were chatting in the Ralph Lauren head office when Violet’s mobile rang and it was Harry having a bit of a moan about being bored.

“Violet interrupted him and said: ‘I’ve got someone who’ll cheer you up,’ and swiftly handed her phone over to Meghan.”

The prince, recently returned from a sombre visit to France for the centenary commemorations of the Battle of the Somme, was not slow in coming forward with Meghan.

“Violet had to eventually interrupt them by asking for her phone back but not before Harry had asked Meghan if she had any plans that evening. She said she wasn’t sure and asked him if he could call back again within the hour.”

That gave Violet enough time to explain to a bemused Meghan just who her friend Harry was, and for Miss Markle to call her friend Markus Anderson to arrange a private room at the Dean Street Townhouse, part of the Soho House group for which Anderson works, and where Meghan was staying the night.

The dinner went so well that Harry asked to see her the next day and they had another date before Meghan had to fly to Toronto on July 5 for promotional work on Suits.

By then both were smitten. Meanwhile Violet, who once had a brief romance with the singer James Blunt, was at Windsor to see the culmination of her matchmaking.

However, she could not stay for the evening celebrations, having previously committed herself to join the wedding reception of two other friends, Ed Watson and CaraLouise Prat.

Honesty from Sharon Osbourne: “If anyone says their facelift doesn’t hurt, they’re lying. It was like I’d spent the night with an axe murderer.”

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WHEN the new series of Poldark begins next month, Eleanor Tomlinson will be caught in full canoodle with a new admirer, a caddish MP, which leads to jealous outbursts from Aidan Turner.

But off-screen the flame-haired cutie who plays Demelza is single and plainly open to the prospect of a romantic entanglement.

“I’m one of those people who loves love,” sighs Eleanor, 26, who last year had a fling with Harry Richardson, her brother Drake in the series.

Previously she had a two-year romance with Ben Atkinson, a horse trainer who was Aidan’s stunt double for those scenes in which Ross gallops along the Cornish coast.

She adds: “I’m fascinated by love, what it does to us, how it messes us up. I love that it’s so much fun, and yet a complete pain in the a***.” Potential suitors need to be attuned to Miss Tomlinson’s thirst for romantic tales, having consumed most of the classics while she was growing up in Yorkshire.

“I watched Gone With The Wind very young,” she gushes, “I’ve probably seen it over 100 times.”

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THERE'S no doubt who Kate Humble would choose as her ideal companion for dinner. “David Attenborough,” says the wildlife broadcaster, 49, firmly.

“He has the most impeccable manners of anyone I have ever met. There are some in the public eye who don’t feel they have to be well-mannered, they feel they’re too famous or whatever, but not him. He sends beautiful hand-written letters, too.”

Perhaps the perky presenter could tempt Sir David to Monmouthshire, where she espouses naturism on her farm, describing taking her clothes off in the open air as “joyous. I urge everyone to try it”.

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BRENDA Blethyn has been signed up for another series of the TV series Vera, which will mean five months’ filming away from home, leaving husband Michael to his own devices.

“I know I can rely on Jack to entertain him,” says the actress, referring to the cockapoo puppy which she bought to keep her hubby company while she is working in Northumberland.

Not that Brenda, 72, has any concerns about Michael, the National Theatre’s former art director, getting up to no good in her absence. She was with him for 35 years before they decided to get married six years ago.

Describing how he finally ensnared her into matrimony, she giggles: “He popped the question on Skype. I think he went down on one knee but I don’t know for sure because he went out of vision. He could have just been tying his shoelaces.”

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“WHY do men bother to dye their hair?” ponders that old trouper Roy Hudd. “Everyone on the telly seems to be at it, using jet-black so it looks like a big hairy tarantula is squatting on their bonce.”

The octogenarian entertainer and his wife Debbie amuse themselves by looking out for glaring examples of follicular faux-pas.

“The one who spots a ‘dyed disaster’ first gets an extra helping of pudding,” says Hudd.

“I like people who are happy to grow old gracefully – like me and George Clooney.”

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CRITICS have, mostly, been fulsome in their praise for A Very English Scandal, the BBC 1 series about former Liberal Party leader Jeremy Thorpe and the attempted murder of his erstwhile lover Norman Scott.

But how does Thorpe’s only son Rupert, 49, feel about this dramatisation of his father’s fall from grace?

Based in California where he runs a photographic agency – he used to be a newspaper picture editor – Rupert says he watched the first episode but declined to give his view about how Jeremy was portrayed by Hugh Grant.

“I’ve been in the media business too long to want to say anything,” Rupert told me politely from his home in Los Angeles, where he lives with his wife Michelle and their son Quinn.

Meanwhile, actor Ben Whishaw, who plays Norman Scott in the series, has revealed he met Scott in London before filming began. “It was fascinating to get his version of events,” says Ben.

“He’s a very funny, clever, naughty guy. So much of what happens to him in the story is quite dreadful but he has a real resilience and humour.”