THE KING AND I

Priscilla Presley is turning 80. Here MARION MCMULLEN looks at the girl who won the heart of a music icon then became a star in her own right

- MARION MCMULLEN

“ELVIS was absolutely the love of my life,” said Priscilla Presley, “and there's no sadness about it because I have my memories, and they're delicious and they're all mine.”

She was born Priscilla Beaulieu on May 24, 1945, and was named after actress Priscilla Lane, Cary Grant's co-star in the movie Arsenic And Old Lace.

Her father, Ensign James Frederick Wagner was a naval submariner and served as a pilot during the Second World War. He sadly died in a plane crash near the border of New York and Connecticut shortly after peace was declared. Priscilla was just a few months old.

Her mother Ann later married Canadian-born United States Air Force officer Paul Beaulieu in 1948. He adopted Priscilla and brought her up.

Her stepfather was stationed in West Germany when she first met Elvis Presley in Bad Nauheim in 1959 when he was serving in the army. She was 14 and he was 10 years older than her, but they stayed in touch and Elvis later invited her to his Memphis home Graceland.

Priscilla once said: “As a person, he was wonderful. He really was a great person. He was full of life. He had a great sense of humour. Very talented, of course, but very caring to his parents. There was a very endearing quality about Elvis.”