Meghan Markle’s Trooping the Colour joke ‘met with yawning silence’ in awkward moment

Meghan Markle was a working royal for less than two years after marrying Prince Harry, but during this time, she did get to experience some key royal events. One of these was Trooping the Colour, which saw The Duchess of Sussex make her balcony debut.

This came about just weeks after Meghan, 44, had married Prince Harry in Windsor. While Meghan looked happy throughout the day, waving to crowds from the carriage and taking in the scenes from the Buckingham Palace balcony, it seems that there was also a tense moment. This happened behind the scenes after the Buckingham Palace balcony appearance.

Talking about the moment in his 2023 memoir Spare, Harry said his wife made a joke after the balcony appearance which did not go down well with Princess Catherine.

He wrote that after they stepped off the balcony, Catherine asked Meghan what she thought of her first Trooping the Colour, and Meghan replied, "Colourful".

He claimed that his wife’s answer was jovial and a light-hearted joke.

However, she didn’t get the reaction she hoped for.

Speaking about the reaction, Harry wrote: "A yawning silence threatened to swallow us all whole."

Meghan Markle attended two Trooping the Colour events - one in 2018 and one in 2019.

Since Meghan and Prince Harry walked away from royal life in 2020, they have not attended Trooping the Colour since.

Their children Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet have never been involved in a Trooping the Colour celebration.