'Paul was fun': Honoring the game's departed star two decades on.

Everything Paul Hunter always wished to do was play snooker.

A competitive passion, sparked at the tender age of three with the help of a tiny snooker set on his parents' coffee table in Leeds, would culminate in a professional career that saw him claim six major trophies in half a dozen years.

Now marks 20 years since the adored Hunter succumbed to cancer, just days before to his birthday marking 28 years.

But notwithstanding the tragic departure of a generational talent that rose above the sport he adored, his influence and memory on snooker and those who followed his career persist as powerful today.

'The game was his life': The Formative Years

"We'd never have known in a billion years Paul would become a professional snooker player," Kristina Hunter recalls.

"However he just loved it."

His dad remembers how his son "cared little for anything else" besides snooker as a young boy.

"He was relentless," he notes. "He competed every night after school."

After persistently asking his dad to take him to a nearby hall to play on regulation tables at the age of eight, the aspiring talent made the leap from home play with great skill.

His mercurial talent would be coached by the 1986 World Champion Joe Johnson, from nearby Bradford, at a now former establishment in the area of Yeadon.

Metoric Ascent: A Star is Born

With his mother and father's requests to do his homework increasingly falling on deaf ears as the game dominated, his parents took the "chance" of taking Hunter out of school at the age of 14 to fully focus on carving out 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 involvement of exclusively the best, Hunter won a trio of times, in the early 2000s.

'A Gracious Competitor': His Enduring Personality

But for all his success on the table, away from the game Hunter's down-to-earth charisma never left him.

"His demeanor was excellent did Paul," Alan says. "He connected with everybody."

"When encountering him you'd take to him," Kristina adds. "He brought joy. 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 "humorous, caring" and "always the last to leave the party".

With his natural likability, boyish good looks and straight-talking media manner, not to mention his considerable talent, Hunter quickly became snooker's pin-up for the new 21st Century.

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

Facing Adversity: A Fight Against Cancer

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

Multiple accounts from across the professional tour speak of the man's extraordinary dedication to keep promises to charity matches, tournaments, and media duties, all while going through treatment.

Despite harsh reactions, Hunter played on through the illness and received a tumultuous reception at The Crucible Theatre when he competed in the World Championships that year.

When he passed away in October 2006, snooker's tight community lost one of its best-loved members.

"It is tragic," Kristina says. "No parent should experience any mum and dad to suffer such a loss."

A Foundation for the Future: Giving Back

Hunter's true impact would be felt not in palaces and castles but in local sports centers 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 program was so successful that, according to reports, anti-social behavior in some areas plummeted.

"The goal was for a scheme to help get kids off the street," one organizer said.

The Foundation helped pave the way for a significant coaching programme, which has provided 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.

Forever in Memory: Two Decades On

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

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

"We are happy to speak about Paul," she continues. "At first it was sad, but I'd rather somebody mention him than him not be mentioned at all."

While he never won the World Championship, the highly probable notion that Hunter would have secured snooker's greatest prize is etched into the sport's legend.

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

But for all his accomplishments, two decades after his death it is Paul Hunter's spirit, as much his spectacular skill with a cue, that will ensure he is forever celebrated.