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Princess then made William stand and explained to her mother that there was a hole in the sofa that offended her. So she ordered him to sit and cover the hole until she was ready to leave the room. He found nothing unusual in such a command – or if he did, he was wise enough to keep his own counsel.
    Once The Queen Mother had died, William found his former colleagues in the Royal Household were not as welcoming as he had hoped they would be and he became a lonely and disillusioned man. He still enjoyed tea at The Ritz if invited but the light had obviously gone out of his life.
    During the final years of William’s life, his connection with the Royal Family was mainly confined to a weekly Sunday lunch with Lord Snowdon, The Queen Mother’s former son-in-law. Queen Elizabeth retained a great affection for Snowdon even after he and Princess Margaret divorced and he was a frequent visitor to Clarence House.
    When he heard about William Tallon’s loneliness following his dismissal from the Royal Household,Tony Snowdon telephoned him and invited him to lunch at his home in Kensington. It became a regular date and William told me that Tony (Lord Snowdon insisted that William use his Christian name) had been a true friend in his hour of need: ‘His loyalty never wavered for a moment.’
    William’s health had been in decline for some years and he died on 23 November 2007. He was seventy-two . Just over a week later his funeral was held in The Queen’s Chapel, St James’s Palace. It was a ceremony meticulously planned by the man himself with every detail laid out: hymns, prayers, eulogy, order of service and final music.
    More than 2,000 mourners applied to attend, with only 200 being admitted to the tiny church.
    Lord Snowdon and his daughter Lady Sarah Chatto were there, but no other member of the Royal Family attended. His Master of the Household represented the Prince of Wales. The rest of the congregation was made up of the great and the good from the worlds of show business, the arts and high society.
    Sir Derek Jacobi read a verse specially written for the occasion ‘in Praise of Billy’, while the actresses Phyllida Law, June Brown (Dot Cotton from Eastenders ) and Patricia Routledge (Mrs Bucket of TV fame) joined in the singing.
    As a final tribute as his Union Jack bedecked coffin was carried from the chapel, the rousing Radetsky March, one of William’s favourite pieces, was played. He chose it to be played at his funeral after hearing it played at the wedding of Princess Anne and Mark Phillips. He would have loved the occasion.
    Eight months after his death, many of William’s treasures, given to him by The Queen Mother and other members of the Royal Family, were sold at auction. There were 700 lots and buyers were attracted from all over the world, some arriving in person to bid, others by telephone.
    An optimistic estimate of the total price was around £200,000. When the final tally was counted, it amounted to a staggering £444,364, more than twice the original estimate.
    A handwritten note from The Queen Mother to William asking him to pack two bottles of Dubonnet and gin for a picnic fetched £16,000. It was expected to sell for £3,000.
    Another letter, this time from Princess Diana to William went for £5,000, while a further seven Diana letters fetched £15,000.
    The bidding was frantic and frenzied with 1,000 people on the telephones competing with the 400 men and women who had crowded into the saleroom in Essex. Among the beneficiaries of the sale were several charities that William had supported.
    The £400,000 would have made a huge difference to his retirement if he had sold them in his lifetime, but he always refused to cash in, even refusing offers, said to be around £1 million, to write his memoirs.
    William Tallon lived his life with panache and joie de vivre. He wasn’t always as popular with his colleagues as he was with his boss, and the senior aides to The Queen Mother – the upstairs