'He brought laughter': Honoring the sport's lost great 20 years on.

Everything the young snooker player truly desired to do was practice the game.

A love for the game, sparked at the tender age of three with the help of a miniature snooker set on his family's living room table in Leeds, would culminate in a life on the tour that saw him claim six major trophies in half a dozen years.

Now marks a score of years since the popular Hunter succumbed to cancer, mere days prior to his 28th birthday.

But notwithstanding the passing of a phenomenal skill that went beyond the sport he adored, his legacy and impact on the sport and those who knew him persist as strong as ever.

'He just loved it': Early Beginnings

"It was impossible to foresee in a billion years the boy would become a professional snooker player," Kristina Hunter says.

"However he just loved it."

Alan Hunter remembers how his son "cared little for anything else" except for snooker as a young boy.

"He never stopped," he adds. "He practiced every night after school."

After persistently asking his dad to take him to a community venue to play on regulation tables at the age of eight, the young Hunter made the leap from home play with remarkable ease.

His natural ability would be developed by the snooker legend Joe Johnson, from neighbouring Bradford, at a now former establishment in the north Leeds suburb of Yeadon.

Rapid Rise: The Path to Glory

With his mother and father's requests to do his homework regularly going unheeded as the game dominated, his parents took the "gamble" of taking Hunter out of school at the fourteen years old to fully focus on forging a career in the game.

It paid off in spades. Within a short period, their adolescent had won his maior professional trophy, the late-nineties Welsh championship.

Considered one of snooker's hardest tournaments to win because of the presence of only the top competitors, Hunter triumphed three times, in 2001, 2002 and 2004.

'A Gracious Competitor': The Man Behind the Cue

But for all his triumphs in the sport, away from the game Hunter's approachable nature never deserted him.

"He was incredibly composed did Paul," Alan says. "He was liked by everybody."

"If you met him you'd take to him," Kristina continues. "Paul was fun. He'd make you feel at ease."

Hunter's widow Lindsey, with whom he had a child, describes him as an "amazing, young cheeky beautiful soul" who was "funny, kind" and "always the last to leave the party".

With his natural likability, youthful appearance and straight-talking media manner, not to mention his immense skill, Hunter quickly became snooker's leading figure for the new millennium.

No wonder then, that he was dubbed 'The Snooker World's Beckham'.

Courage in Crisis: His Final Years

In that year, a year that should have signaled the height of his career, Hunter was diagnosed with cancer and would later undergo aggressive treatment.

Multiple accounts from across the professional tour highlight the man's extraordinary dedication to honor obligations to public appearances and promotional work, all while undergoing treatment.

Despite difficult symptoms, Hunter continued to compete through the illness and received a standing ovation at The World Championship arena when he played at the World Championships that year.

When he succumbed in October 2006, snooker's family-like circuit lost one of its most popular brothers.

"It is tragic," Kristina says. "It is a terrible thing for any mum and dad to go through that pain."

An Enduring Legacy: The Paul Hunter Foundation

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

The foundation he inspired, set up before his death, would provide no-cost coaching to children all over the country.

The initiative was so successful that, according to reports, issues with young people in some areas fell sharply.

"The goal was for a platform to help provide a positive outlet," one coach said.

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

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

Always Remembered: Two Decades On

Classic footage of their son's matches online help his parents stay "connected to him".

"I can access it and I can watch Paul at any moment," Kristina says. "It's marvellous!"

"We like to reminisce about Paul," she concludes. "At first it was sad, but I'd rather somebody remember him than him not be mentioned at all."

While he never won the World Championship, the highly probable notion that Hunter would have gone on to lift snooker's greatest prize is ingrained in the sport's history.

The Masters, the competition with which he is forever linked, commences later this month. The winner will lift the Paul Hunter Trophy.

But for all his achievements, 20 years after his death it is Paul Hunter's character, as much his dazzling snooker ability, that will ensure he is never forgotten.