'He was a joy': Honoring the sport's taken talent two decades on.

All Paul Hunter truly desired to do was practice the game.

A sporting bug, sparked at the very young age of three with the help of a small snooker set on his parents' coffee table in the city of Leeds, would culminate in a life on the tour that saw him win six major trophies in a six-year span.

Now marks 20 years since the beloved Hunter passed away from cancer, mere days prior to his 28th birthday.

But notwithstanding the loss of a once-in-a-generation player that transcended the game he loved, his legacy and impact on the sport and those who were close to him remain as powerful today.

'The game was his life': A Childhood Obsession

"It was impossible to foresee in a lifetime Paul would become a career sportsman," Hunter's mum recalls.

"However he just adored it."

Hunter's father recalls how his son "cared little for anything else" other than snooker as a young boy.

"He was relentless," he says. "He would play 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 young Hunter made the leap from miniature games with aplomb.

His raw skill would be developed by the former world title holder Joe Johnson, from nearby Bradford, at a now closed venue in the area of Yeadon.

Rapid Rise: The Path to Glory

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

It paid off in spades. Within five years, their still-teenage son had won his first ranking title, the late-nineties Welsh championship.

Considered one of snooker's most difficult competitions to win because of the presence of exclusively the best, Hunter was victorious a trio of times, in consecutive years.

'A Cheeky Charm': The Man Behind the Cue

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

"He had a great temperament did Paul," Alan says. "He was liked by everybody."

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

Hunter's widow Lindsey, with whom he had a child, describes him as an "incredible, lively, and kind spirit" who was "witty, generous" and "never the first to depart from 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 christened 'The Snooker World's Beckham'.

Courage in Crisis: A Fight Against Cancer

In 2005, a year that should have been the zenith of his talent, Hunter was found to have cancer and would later undergo cancer therapy.

Multiple stories from across the snooker circuit highlight the man's extraordinary willingness to honor obligations to charity matches, tournaments, and media duties, all while enduring treatment.

Despite gruelling side effects, Hunter played on through the illness and received a rapturous applause at The World Championship arena when he competed in the World Championships that year.

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

"It's awful," Kristina says. "It is a terrible thing for any mum and dad to lose a child."

A Foundation for the Future: Giving Back

Hunter's true impact would be felt not in palaces and castles but in community venues across the UK.

The foundation he inspired, set up before his death, would provide free snooker sessions to children all over the country.

The initiative was so successful that, according to reports, local youth crime rates in some areas dropped significantly.

"The goal was for a program to help offer a constructive activity," one coach said.

The Foundation helped lay the groundwork for a major coaching programme, which has opened up playing opportunities to children all over the world.

"It would have thrilled him what we've done with the sport and where it is today," a leading figure in the sport stated.

Never Forgotten: Two Decades On

Archive videos of their son's matches on YouTube help his parents stay "close to him".

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

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

While he never won the World Championship, the common opinion that Hunter would have eventually won snooker's greatest prize is ingrained in the sport's legend.

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

But for all his accomplishments, a generation after his death it is Paul Hunter's spirit, as much his brilliant talent on the table, that will ensure he is never forgotten.