Meghan Markle's show exposes the royal family's big mistake.

Did they jump or were they pushed?

Five whole years since Harry and Meghan Sussex "stepped back" from royal duties, it's still a contested truth.

The "proper" royals, over in stuffy old England in their castles and manors, insist they tried to negotiate with a distraught Harry about staying in the fold, back in January 2020. Harry, in his book Spare, said that he and Meghan gave the old guard (including Queen Granny and his now King Dad) plenty of chances to get their crowned heads around a modern, less restrictive model of Prince and Princesses.

Maybe they could live in South Africa, and carry out duties from there? Maybe Canada? Maybe they could, I don't know, live in California, in a beautiful big house and be allowed to make their own money but still be royal-ish, spreading the word and doing good works?

We all know what happened to those ideas. Nope. Nup. Absolutely not.

And look what happened. A family estranged. Bonded brothers no longer talking. Several mighty media lawsuits, a huge row over who pays for bodyguards and accusations of racist royals being broadcast via Oprah.

And yet, five years on. Harry and Meghan Sussex live in a beautiful big house in California. Make plenty of their own money. Travel the world. Do good work. And are still a Duke and a Duchess, parents to a little Prince and a little Princess. A little more, perhaps, than royal-ish.

This week's debut of With Love, Meghan illustrates — in glorious neutral tones, scented with lavender and beeswax — what the royal family lost when Harry and Meghan decamped: Possibly the most perfect princess who ever there was.

Watch: The official trailer for With Love, Meghan, now available to stream on Netflix. Post continues after video.

The Netflix show, which surely I don't have to explain to you at this point, is a lifestyle offering. Meghan Sussex cooks and crafts and prunes and picks in a house that isn't hers, and a garden that is. She talks to guests, but not about anything very revelatory or important, and she's beautiful and groomed and pleasant and polished. She doesn't embarrass, or overshare. She doesn't chew with her mouth open. She doesn't reveal state secrets, or accidently display Harry's bong. She presents as an involved mother, a besotted wife, a fashion-plate with a social conscience. And someone who understands being looked at, judged and critiqued. Who's been through the fire of extraordinary scrutiny and decided to keep step back into the camera's eye regardless.

We need to show the people enough, this new version of Meghan seems to understand, to want to be us. But nothing very real. Nothing ugly or opinionated. Nothing raw (except honey) or angry. Nothing scruffy or contentious. Give them a picture of restrained, approachable, bland perfection.

And what could be more princessy than that?

The job description of being a royal woman is being able to withstand extreme surveillance with a smile. Even while they're spying on you, as Princess Diana found out, doing leg presses at the gym. Even while you're going through cancer treatment, as Catherine, Princess of Wales discovered last year. And even while you're trying to modernise the pale and stale monarchy with a different cultural outlook and a can-do California attitude, as Meghan has experienced, no question.

And yet here she is, keeping on.

What's profoundly ironic about where With Love, Meghan has landed the Sussex's latest rebrand is that there is nothing even a little bit dangerous or risky about it. And it shows, perhaps, that all the sky-is-falling media panicking that Meghan and Harry were much too radical to stay royal was maybe the biggest tabloid lie of all.

They like comfort and wealth.

In Spare, Harry makes it quite clear that he envies Hollywood stars and millionaires in their modern mansions with multiple flushing toilets. Meghan's much-discussed TIG era was named after an Italian wine that you too can try for around AU$500, and was a blog crammed with Goop-esque reccos for the best place to grab a cocktail in Milan. It's best not even to think about what the beekeeper costs.

They like inoffensive social justice causes.

It's hard — and entirely unnecessary — to pick fault with Harry's baby, the Invictus Games, which raises awareness of veterans injured in service by showcasing what they can do rather than what they can't. It's hard to pick a fault — and entirely unnecessary — to diss Sentable, Harry's organisation that works with young people in Southern Africa to provide community solutions to poverty and disadvantage. Or Meghan's broad "feminist" remit to inspire young girls of colour. Nothing to see there.

And, they like hanging out with fancy people of influence.

Oprah. The Trudeaus. Serena Williams. Gloria Steinam. Tyler Perry. The Clooneys. The list goes on.

There has never been a senior royal who didn't love being close to glamour and money beyond even their imagining. It has got some of them into trouble (cough, Prince Andrew).

Meghan Sussex of Montecito is just a new kind of royal. A savvy, battle-scarred, entirely inoffensive model who knows that there's real power in making your own money — one tin of flower sprinkles at a time — rather than waiting for a royal handout that comes with golden handcuffs.

One without the stinky colonial baggage.

And the freedom to drive the "real royals" crazy.

It must feel good in Montecito this morning.

Read more about Meghan Markle:

• Royal jam, the little guy and Meghan's latest Big Mistake.

• 'I believe in my soul that Meghan Markle is trolling us and I'm eating it up.'

• There's an art to hating Meghan Markle.

Feature image: Netflix.