Duchess Catherine's childhood friend dies

Duchess Catherine's childhood friend Isobel Kennerley has died at the age of 33 following a battle with a brain tumour.

Isobel Kennerley tragically passed away in May at the Duchess of Kent Hospice in Reading, England, following a battle with an inoperable brain tumour, and was laid to rest a short while later at St Francis de Sales Catholic Church in Walsh Common.

Isobel - who had cerebral palsy - became friends with the 35-year-old royal in 1990 through the young girl organisation the Brownies and the pair of them went on a trip with Catherine's sister Pippa Middleton over the Easter period in 1991.

Isobel later said of the trip: "I really enjoyed it. Everyone was really kind to me because I have a disability. I remember going to brownie camp at Macaroni Wood and coming back to find an owl at the end of my bed. I don't remember what I did to deserve it, but I remember feeling really pleased."

However, the childhood friends went their separate ways when they reached secondary school age as Catherine boarded at Marlborough College in Wiltshire, while Isobel attended St Gabriel's in Newbury, according to HELLO! magazine.

It's not known whether Catherine - who is now married to Prince William and has two children George, four, and Charlotte, two, with him - attended Isobel's funeral.

During the ceremony, her family - including husband Scott and parents Christine and Simon - said Isobel had fought the disease with "amazing courage and dignity."

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