'He was a joy': Remembering the sport's lost great 20 years on.

Everything the Leeds-born talent always wished to do was practice the game.

A competitive passion, developed at the very young age of three with the help of a small snooker set on his family's living room table in Leeds, would lead to a pro playing days that saw him secure six major trophies in six years.

Now marks 20 years since the adored Hunter died from cancer, just days before to his 28th birthday.

But in spite of the passing of a phenomenal skill that rose above the pastime he cherished, his legacy and impact on snooker and those who knew him persist as powerful today.

'His passion was clear': Early Beginnings

"It was impossible to foresee in a lifetime the boy would become a professional snooker player," Kristina Hunter recalls.

"Yet he just adored it."

Alan Hunter remembers how his son "cared little for anything else" other than snooker as a youth.

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

After persistently asking his dad to take him to a community venue to play on full-size tables at the age of eight, the aspiring talent made the leap from table top snooker with remarkable ease.

His natural ability would be nurtured by the 1986 World Champion Joe Johnson, from the adjacent city, at a now defunct club in the area of Yeadon.

Quick Success: A Star is Born

With his parents' pleas to do his homework often being ignored as the game dominated, his parents took the "gamble" of taking Hunter out of school at the fourteen years old to fully focus on forging a career in the game.

It was a resounding success. Within five years, their adolescent had won his maior professional trophy, the Welsh Open of 1998.

Considered one of snooker's hardest tournaments to win because of the lineup featuring only the top competitors, Hunter won on three occasions, in the early 2000s.

'A Cheeky Charm': The Man Behind the Cue

But for all his achievements in competition, 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."

"When encountering him you'd take to him," Kristina adds. "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, handsome features and honest interview style, not to mention his prodigious ability, Hunter quickly became snooker's pin-up for the modern era.

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

Facing Adversity: His Final Years

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 accounts from across the snooker circuit speak of the man's extraordinary commitment to keep promises to public appearances and promotional work, all while enduring treatment.

Despite gruelling side effects, Hunter continued to compete through the illness and received a tumultuous reception 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 best-loved members.

"It's awful," Kristina says. "It is a terrible thing for any mum and dad to go through that pain."

A Foundation for the Future: Inspiring Youth

Hunter's true contribution 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 accessible training to youths all over the country.

The scheme was so successful that, according to reports, anti-social behavior in some areas fell sharply.

"The aim remained for a program to help get kids off the street," one official said.

The Foundation helped lay the groundwork for a significant coaching programme, which has opened up playing opportunities to children globally.

"Paul would have loved what we've done with the sport and where it is today," a chairman in the sport stated.

Forever in Memory: A Lasting Presence

Historic matches of their son's matches online help his parents stay "connected 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 adds. "Before it would be tears, but I'd rather somebody remember him than him not be recalled."

Although he never won the World Championship, the highly probable notion that Hunter would have secured snooker's greatest prize is ingrained in the sport's folklore.

The Masters, the competition with which he is most associated, commences later this month. The winner will lift the memorial cup.

But for all his accomplishments, two decades after his death it is Paul Hunter's character, as much his dazzling snooker ability, that will ensure he is forever celebrated.