SOPHIE Rhys-Jones is Middle England personified. A sporty gel who wears nice, sensible clothes and has the kind of PR job to which all Sophies, Amandas, and Persephones aspire, she has been the soul of discretion since she was moved into Buckingham Palace during the darkest days of the royal divorces.

She is sixth cousin once removed of the First Viscount Molesworth, who is a relative of the late Princess Diana, but her more immediate family are more lowly green-welly-wearers.

Her grandfather, who spent some time in Borneo, became headmaster of a Devon prep school in the 1930s, and her father, Christopher, who was born in Sarawak, was a shootin' and fishin' sort of chap who went to Africa to see the world before settling down with secretary Mary O'Sullivan. Sophie has an older brother, David, and she is nine months younger than Prince Edward.

If Edward is considered the brightest of his siblings, Sophie leans more to the athletic. She gained eight O levels but hockey, netball, ski-ing and surfing are more her ball game. She put herself through college by working in a pub and then back-packed round Australia.

There have been boyfriends, as befits a woman of 33, and she assured her friends that whatever the papers said, Edward was not gay. Otherwise, she has not put a foot wrong, even when her prince failed to name the day.

Whatever the Duke of Edinburgh thinks of his son, his future daughter-in-law seems to have passed muster on every front. Born on the cusp of Capricorn and Aquarius, she is said to have an off-beat sense of humour. She must have learned during the past five years that it is her greatest strength.