Learn from my mistake, Meghan – don’t emasculate Harry: AMANDA PLATELL

Kelly Mckee Zajfen joined Meghan Markle at the LA Children’s Hospital gala. The Duchess of Sussex caught all eyes tonight as she made a glamorous appearance re-wearing a revealing red Carolina Herrera gown.

I’ve always backed Meghan. But the red dress pictures have led me to a startling realisation.. and I can no longer support herDecades after the end of my marriage, there’s a question I still ask myself.

He was no longer a name in his own right, he was merely the ‘other’ guest invited alongside me to grand events. Whenever we went to the Royal Opera House, to Bruce Springsteen concerts, gala newspaper events, dinners with friends, I was always the centre of attention. And this was some fall from grace for John, a former newspaper executive who’d also been the centre of my world in the early days of our relationship.

Barely two years after he portrayed himself as the forgotten Spare in his venge-fest book of the same name, is Prince Harry in danger of becoming a spare part in his own marriage, too? The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s recent public appearances on their own contrast with their usual team approach, here during their tour of Nigeria in MayOf course I am not comparing the unexpected, minor celebrity status I attained early on in my marriage to that of Meghan. And yet as the girl from Applecreek, in Perth, Australia, who became an overnight success, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t find all the attention intoxicating.

That night he invited me to a Hall & Oates concert he had tickets to. The first time he kissed me was when they sang their hit Kiss On My List, including the lyrics, ‘Your kiss is on my list of the best things in life.’ Much more kissing ensued, he proposed in the tiny kitchen of the flat we later shared and we wed in 1985 in Sydney.We decided to celebrate our marriage by having an adventure, backpacking across the world to London, which was one of the happiest times of my life.

Soon newspapers were writing about this glamorous, powerful Aussie from nowhere; a TV show, unkindly named Killer Bimbos Of Fleet Street, was even made about me and other successful newspaper women. When I confronted him that night, he said it was a ‘cry for help’. I cried too, then contacted the most expensive divorce lawyers I could find, and suggested he spend some time with his best friend in LA. The moment he left, I changed the locks.

Many of my girlfriends found their marriages failed once their careers took off. And now I fear that Meghan is making the same mistake – emasculating a once- proud man. It’s not a case of giving up your dreams either. It’s more about remembering the dreams you had together, and keeping in view the fact that you are sharing a life – there has to be give and take.