'He was a joy': Honoring the sport's departed star a score of years on.

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

A sporting bug, developed at the very young age of three with the help of a miniature snooker set on his family's living room table in the city of Leeds, would result in a professional career that saw him win six major trophies in a six-year span.

This year marks a score of years since the beloved Hunter passed away from cancer, just days before to his twenty-eighth birthday.

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

'The game was his life': The Formative Years

"We'd never have known in a lifetime the boy would become a career sportsman," Hunter's mum states.

"However he just adored it."

Alan Hunter recounts how his son "showed no interest in anything else" except for snooker as a child.

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

After successfully badgering his dad to take him to a community venue to play on regulation tables at the age of eight, the aspiring talent made the transition from home play with aplomb.

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

Metoric Ascent: A Star is Born

With his family's urging to do his homework regularly going unheeded as practice took priority, his parents took the "risk" of taking Hunter out of school at the mid-teens to fully concentrate on carving out a career in the game.

It was a resounding success. Within half a decade, their still-teenage son had won his initial major win, the late-nineties Welsh championship.

Considered one of snooker's most difficult competitions to win because of the involvement of exclusively the best, Hunter triumphed three times, in the early 2000s.

'A Gracious Competitor': A Legacy of Character

But for all his achievements in competition, away from the game Hunter's approachable nature never faded.

"He was incredibly composed did Paul," Alan says. "He connected with everybody."

"Upon meeting him you'd like him," Kristina adds. "He was enjoyable. He'd make you comfortable."

Hunter's wife Lindsey, with whom he had daughter Evie, describes him as an "wonderful, youthful, and fun personality" who was "witty, generous" and "always the last to leave the party".

With his easy charm, handsome features and straight-talking media manner, not to mention his prodigious ability, Hunter quickly became snooker's poster boy for the new millennium.

No wonder then, that he was dubbed 'The Beckham of the Baize'.

Facing Adversity: Illness and Resilience

In 2005, a year that should have signaled the height of his career, Hunter was told he had cancer and would later undergo cancer therapy.

Multiple anecdotes from across the professional tour attest to the man's extraordinary commitment to fulfill commitments to public appearances and promotional work, all while undergoing treatment.

Despite harsh reactions, Hunter kept playing through the illness and received a rapturous applause at The World Championship arena when he turned out for the World Championships that year.

When he succumbed in autumn 2006, snooker's tight community lost one of its cherished personalities.

"The pain is immense," Kristina says. "No parent should experience any mum and dad to go through that pain."

A Foundation for the Future: Giving Back

Hunter's true impact would be felt not in high society but in local sports centers across the UK.

The charity in his name, set up before his death, would provide accessible training to children all over the country.

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

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

The Foundation helped pave the way for a significant coaching programme, which has extended playing opportunities to children globally.

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

Forever in Memory: 20 Years Later

Classic footage of their son's matches via the internet help his parents stay "in touch with his memory".

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

"We are happy to speak about Paul," she continues. "Before it would be tears, but I'd rather somebody mention 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 etched into the sport's folklore.

The Masters, the competition with which he is forever linked, commences 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 personality, as much his dazzling snooker ability, that will ensure he is forever celebrated.