'Paul was fun': Honoring snooker's departed star 20 years on.

Everything the Leeds-born talent ever wanted to do was play snooker.

A love for the game, caught at the very young age of three with the help of a small snooker set on his home's central table in his Leeds home, would lead to a professional career that saw him win six major trophies in six years.

The present year marks 20 years since the adored Hunter died from cancer, days short to his birthday marking 28 years.

But in spite of the loss of a once-in-a-generation player that transcended the sport he adored, his enduring mark on the game and those who knew him endure as vibrant now.

'The game was his life': The Formative Years

"We could not have predicted in a lifetime the boy would become a pro on the circuit," Kristina Hunter recalls.

"However he just was passionate about it."

Alan Hunter recalls how his son "cared little for anything else" except for snooker as a youth.

"He never stopped," he notes. "He would play every night after school."

After repeatedly pleading with his dad to take him to a community venue to play on full-size tables at the age of eight, the young Hunter made the transition from miniature games with remarkable ease.

His natural ability would be nurtured by the former world title holder Joe Johnson, from nearby Bradford, at a now closed venue in the north Leeds suburb of Yeadon.

Quick Success: A Star is Born

With his family's urging to do his homework regularly going unheeded as practice took priority, his parents took the "risk" of taking Hunter out of school at the mid-teens to fully dedicate himself to building a career in the game.

It proved a masterstroke. Within five years, their young son had won his first ranking title, the 1998 Welsh Open.

Considered one of snooker's most difficult competitions to win because of the presence of exclusively the best, Hunter was victorious three times, in consecutive years.

'A Gracious Competitor': A Legacy of Character

But for all his achievements in competition, away from the game Hunter's humble charm never faded.

"He had a great temperament did Paul," Alan says. "He was liked by everybody."

"When encountering him you'd take to him," Kristina adds. "He was enjoyable. He'd make you feel at ease."

Hunter's wife Lindsey, with whom he had a child, describes him as an "incredible, lively, and kind spirit" who was "funny, kind" and "never the first to depart from the party".

With his natural likability, youthful appearance and candid way with the press, not to mention his prodigious ability, Hunter quickly became snooker's poster boy for the new millennium.

No wonder then, that he was dubbed 'The Beckham of the Baize'.

Facing Adversity: A Fight Against Cancer

In the mid-2000s, a year that should have signaled the peak of his powers, Hunter was diagnosed with cancer and would later undergo cancer therapy.

Multiple anecdotes from across the sporting world highlight the man's extraordinary willingness to honor obligations to charity matches, tournaments, and media duties, all while enduring treatment.

Despite gruelling side effects, Hunter kept playing through the illness and received a rapturous applause at The famous Sheffield venue when he turned out for the World Championships that year.

When he died in autumn 2006, snooker's close-knit fraternity lost one of its most popular brothers.

"The pain is immense," Kristina says. "No parent should experience any mum and dad to suffer such a loss."

A Foundation for the Future: The Paul Hunter Foundation

Hunter's true impact would be felt not in high society but in snooker halls and clubs across the UK.

The charity in his name, set up before his death, would provide accessible training to youths all over the country.

The scheme was so successful that, according to reports, local youth crime rates in some areas fell sharply.

"The goal was for a program to help get kids off the street," one coach said.

The Foundation helped lay the groundwork for a significant coaching programme, which has opened up playing opportunities to children internationally.

"Paul would have loved what we've done with the sport and where it is today," a senior official in the sport stated.

Forever in Memory: 20 Years Later

Archive videos of their son's matches on YouTube help his parents stay "close to him".

"I can access it and I can watch Paul anytime," Kristina says. "It's wonderful!"

"We don't mind talking about Paul," she concludes. "Initially it was painful, but I'd rather somebody remember him than him not be recalled."

While he never won the World Championship, the highly probable notion that Hunter would have gone on to lift snooker's top honor is etched into the sport's folklore.

The Masters, the competition with which he is most synonymous, starts later this month. The winner will lift the trophy named in his honor.

But for all his successes, two decades after his death it is Paul Hunter's character, as much his dazzling snooker ability, that will ensure he is forever celebrated.