Britain's Prince Edward used to "smuggle" former girlfriend Ruthie Henshall into his London residence Buckingham Palace, the stage star has revealed. The singer - who first met the prince when she starred in musical 'Cats' on London's West End - admits she often went to visit her royal love but their meetings had to be conducted in secret. Ruthie said: "We dated solidly for a couple of years, but on and off for five. We couldn't quite let go. When we dated I used to go to Buckingham Palace quite a lot because he lived there, but I was smuggled in in my car. It always used to make me laugh - I'd sort of say 'I'm going to my boyfriend's tonight'. Nobody knew who he was." Ruthie - who attended the wedding of Prince Edward and Sophie Rhys Jones, now the Earl and Countess of Wessex, with her former fiancé John Gordon Sinclar, in 1999 - also revealed the reasons behind her split from Edward. She said: "It was very exciting, but I genuinely fell in love with him. I think I had hopes that we could walk on in our relationship but really and truthfully I think I was very aware that I wouldn't be able to do what I do for a living if I'd have stayed with him. "If you think about it I would be in the theatre doing eight shows a week, they'd have to check out the theatre every night, check everyone's bags, it would be just impossible, and there was nothing - at that stage - that was more important than what I did." The 41-year-old beauty - who now has two children with husband Tim Howar - also said she was surprised by the normalcy of Britain's royal family. Speaking on BBC Radio Four's 'Desert Island Discs', she said: "When they are behind closed doors they are a family, and they have barbeques like a family and they talk like a family. "I never saw the queen turning sausages on the barbeque but I did see Charles!"