Meghan Markle grew up in Hollywood, CA, and attended private schools in her youth. She graduated from Immaculate Heart — an all-girl Catholic middle school — in 1995. At the age of 11, she launched a successful campaign to change a national commercial she viewed as sexist and was profiled by Linda Ellerbee on Nick News.

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Meghan Markle continued her education at Immaculate Heart high school and graduated in 1999. Her father, Thomas Markle, and mother, Doria Loyce Ragland, divorced when she was six years old. When explaining her ethnicity to ELLE in 2015, Markle stated: "My dad is Caucasian and my mom is African American. I'm half black and half white. ... I have come to embrace this and say who I am, to share where I'm from, to voice my pride in being a strong, confident, mixed-race woman.”

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Early in her career, Meghan Markle small guest roles on the television shows Century City (2004), The War at Home (2006) and CSI: NY (2006).

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Aside from acting, Meghan Markle also worked as a model, which included a brief stint as a briefcase girl on Deal or No Deal.

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In an essay written for ELLE in 2015, Meghan Markle opened up about the struggles she endured in the beginning of her career. "I wasn't black enough for the black roles and I wasn't white enough for the white ones,” she explained, “leaving me somewhere in the middle as the ethnic chameleon who couldn't book a job."

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In 2011, Meghan Markle landed a role in Suits, playing the paralegal turned attorney Rachel Zane.

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Before joining the cast of Suits, Meghan Markle appeared in two 2010 films, Get Him to the Greek and Remember Me, and one 2011 film, Horrible Bosses.

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Aside from movies and Suits, Meghan Markle also appeared in episodes of Cuts; Love, Inc., 90210; Knight Rider, Without a Trace, The League and Castle.

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In 2013, Meghan Markle attended the Annual Charity Day Hosted By Cantor Fitzgerald And BGC. She has always been an outspoken humanitarian and considers herself a feminist.

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Meghan Markle played Rachel Zane on Suits for seven seasons.

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As if acting, modeling and charity work were not enough, Meghan Markle started a lifestyle website called "The Tig" in 2014.

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Meghan Markle worked as the editor-in-chief of The Tig for years before shutting down the site in April 2017.

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During her time on Suits, Meghan Markle attended many network get togethers, including 2015’s NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment Upfront at The Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

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In 2015, Meghan Markle wowed the crowd at The Twelfth Annual CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Awards—an annual competition to cultivate the next generation of emerging American design talent.

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With her hand on the pulse of both the entertainment and fashion worlds, Meghan Markle attended ELLE's 6th Annual Women In Television Dinner in January of 2016.

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As she began to become more well known for her acting and fashion awareness, Meghan Markle made her rounds on the media circuit, including visiting AOL Studios in New York on March 17, 2016.

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As Meghan Markle’s fame grew, so did her media appearances. Here she is seen at the Today Show on March 18, 2016.

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In June of 2016, Meghan Markle attended day two of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships in a Royal box, which also happens to be right around the time she and Prince Harry went on their fated blind date.

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On July 14, 2016 Meghan Markle went on The Today Show to talk about Season 6 of Suits. A few months later, her relationship with Prince Harry would hit the headlines.

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Though the show has been renewed for an eighth season, Meghan Markle ended her time on Suits in 2017.

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Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s first photographed public appearance was at the 2017 Invictus Games in Toronto, Canada. Just weeks before, the actress opened up to Vanity Fair about her relationship, saying, “at the end of the day I think it is really simple. We’re two people who are really happy.”

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On November 27, it was announced that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were engaged.

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Lisa St. Regis

About Lisa St. Regis