'He was a joy': Reflecting on the game's departed star 20 years on.

Everything the young snooker player truly desired to do was play snooker.

A love for the game, sparked at the tender age of three with the help of a tiny snooker set on his family's living room table in his Leeds home, would culminate in a pro playing days that saw him win half a dozen major wins in half a dozen years.

The present year marks a score of years since the popular Hunter succumbed to cancer, just days before to his twenty-eighth birthday.

But notwithstanding the passing of a once-in-a-generation player that went beyond the sport he adored, his influence and memory on the game and those who knew him persist as strong as ever.

'He just loved it': A Childhood Obsession

"It was impossible to foresee in a billion years the boy would become a career sportsman," Kristina Hunter states.

"Yet he just loved it."

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

"His dedication was constant," he says. "He would play every night after school."

After successfully badgering his dad to take him to a local club to play on regulation tables at the age of eight, the young Hunter made the leap from table top snooker with great skill.

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

Metoric Ascent: The Path to Glory

With his family's urging to do his homework increasingly falling on deaf ears as training came first, his parents took the "chance" of taking Hunter out of school at the age of 14 to fully concentrate on forging a career in the game.

It proved a masterstroke. Within a short period, their adolescent had won his maior professional trophy, the 1998 Welsh Open.

Considered one of snooker's toughest events to win because of the lineup featuring exclusively the best, Hunter was victorious on three occasions, in consecutive years.

'A Cheeky Charm': His Enduring Personality

But for all his achievements in competition, away from the game Hunter's down-to-earth charisma never left him.

"He had a great temperament did Paul," Alan says. "He connected with everybody."

"Upon meeting him you'd like him," Kristina continues. "Paul was fun. He'd make you comfortable."

Hunter's partner Lindsey, with whom he had daughter Evie, describes him as an "wonderful, youthful, and fun personality" who was "witty, generous" and "always the last to leave the party".

With his natural likability, boyish good looks and honest interview style, not to mention his immense skill, Hunter quickly became snooker's leading figure for the modern era.

No wonder then, that he was nicknamed 'A Sporting Icon'.

Courage in Crisis: A Fight Against Cancer

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

Multiple anecdotes from across the sporting world attest to the man's extraordinary dedication to fulfill commitments to public appearances and promotional work, all while enduring treatment.

Despite gruelling side effects, Hunter kept playing through the illness and received a standing ovation at The World Championship arena when he competed in the World Championships that year.

When he passed away in autumn 2006, snooker's tight community lost one of its cherished personalities.

"It is tragic," Kristina says. "I wouldn't wish any mum and dad to go through that pain."

A Foundation for the Future: Inspiring Youth

Hunter's true legacy would be felt not in royal circles but in snooker halls and clubs across the UK.

The Paul Hunter Foundation, set up before his death, would provide no-cost coaching to young people all over the country.

The scheme was so successful that, according to reports, anti-social behavior in some areas plummeted.

"The goal was for a scheme to help offer a constructive activity," one organizer said.

The Foundation helped establish the basis for a huge coaching programme, which has extended playing opportunities to children globally.

"He would have embraced what we've done with the sport and where it is today," a chairman in the sport stated.

Never Forgotten: Two Decades On

Historic matches of their son's matches online help his parents stay "in touch with his memory".

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

"We are happy to speak about Paul," she continues. "Initially it was painful, but I'd rather somebody remember him than him not be spoken of."

Even though he never won the World Championship, the highly probable notion that Hunter would have gone on to lift snooker's ultimate trophy is ingrained in the sport's folklore.

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

But for all his accomplishments, 20 years after his death it is Paul Hunter's personality, as much his brilliant talent on the table, that will ensure he is always remembered.