'He brought laughter': Honoring the sport's lost great a score of years on.

Everything the Leeds-born talent truly desired to do was compete on the baize.

A love for the game, developed at the age of three with the help of a small snooker set on his family's living room table in the city of Leeds, would lead to a life on the tour that saw him win six significant titles in a six-year span.

Now marks a score of years since the adored Hunter died from cancer, days short to his twenty-eighth birthday.

But notwithstanding the loss of a phenomenal skill that rose above the game he loved, his influence and memory on the game and those who knew him persist as powerful today.

'His passion was clear': The Formative Years

"We could not have predicted in a million years our son would become a professional snooker player," Kristina Hunter states.

"Yet he just was passionate about it."

Alan Hunter recounts how his son "wasn't bothered about anything else" besides snooker as a youth.

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

After persistently asking his dad to take him to a nearby hall to play on professional-standard tables at the age of eight, the aspiring talent made the jump from table top snooker with aplomb.

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

Metoric Ascent: The Path to Glory

With his mother and father's requests to do his homework often being ignored as practice took priority, his parents took the "chance" of taking Hunter out of school at the age of 14 to fully concentrate on carving out a career in the game.

It was a resounding success. Within a short period, their adolescent had won his maior professional trophy, the late-nineties Welsh championship.

Considered one of snooker's most difficult competitions to win because of the involvement of only the top competitors, Hunter was victorious a trio of times, in consecutive years.

'Paul was fun': His Enduring Personality

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

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

"When encountering him you'd take to him," Kristina continues. "He brought joy. He'd make you comfortable."

Hunter's widow Lindsey, with whom he had daughter Evie, describes him as an "amazing, young cheeky beautiful soul" who was "funny, kind" and "never the first to depart from the party".

With his natural likability, handsome features and straight-talking media manner, not to mention his immense skill, Hunter quickly became snooker's poster boy for the modern era.

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

Facing Adversity: Illness and Resilience

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

Multiple stories from across the sporting world attest to the man's extraordinary commitment to fulfill commitments to charity matches, tournaments, and media duties, all while undergoing treatment.

Despite harsh reactions, Hunter kept playing through the illness and received a standing ovation at The Crucible Theatre when he turned out for the World Championships that year.

When he passed away in October 2006, snooker's close-knit fraternity lost one of its most popular brothers.

"It is tragic," Kristina says. "No parent should experience any mum and dad to lose a child."

An Enduring Legacy: Inspiring Youth

Hunter's true legacy would be felt not in royal circles but in community venues across the UK.

The Paul Hunter Foundation, 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, anti-social behavior in some areas plummeted.

"The aim remained for a scheme to help provide a positive outlet," one organizer said.

The Foundation helped pave the way for a major 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 senior official in the sport stated.

Never Forgotten: A Lasting Presence

Archive videos of their son's matches via the internet help his parents stay "close to him".

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

"We like to reminisce about Paul," she concludes. "Before it would be tears, but I'd rather somebody mention him than him not be mentioned at all."

While he never won the World Championship, the common opinion that Hunter would have gone on to lift snooker's top honor is a part of the sport's folklore.

The Masters, the competition with which he is most synonymous, begins later this month. The winner will lift the Paul Hunter Trophy.

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