Interior designer Kenneth Bordewick, who was a regular visitor to the Jackson home before Michael died of a drug overdose in 2009, tells me: ‘Paris has always ruled the roost. She was in charge of the whole house before Michael died. The kids were completely spoiled by the staff, and Paris told everyone what to do, including her father. They would have big arguments; there was always a lot of drama with Paris.’

She was only 11 when Jackson died, and to this day, it’s said she assumes a maternal role, particularly where her younger brother Prince Michael, 11, is concerned.

Although his children emerged into a kind of normality after his death, they had to deal with the burden of sudden fame alongside their grief.

Paris seems concerned by her father’s legacy — and wants him to be remembered as a consummate entertainer, not a drug-addicted oddball.

In a newspaper interview last month she talked about wanting to get his old Neverland estate going as a kind of theme park — to help underprivileged children. She doesn’t see — as he didn’t — that the idea of an accused paedophile helping children could be viewed as grotesque. As a teenage user of social media, she has been bombarded with distasteful messages about his proclivities.

She is also said to be terrified by the prospect of testifying at the ongoing ‘wrongful death’ lawsuit the Jacksons are bringing against concert promoters AEG. Michael was signed to perform a series of gigs which the family argues he was in no fit state to perform. She can expect to be asked about her father’s health and state of mind before he died, and the events of the day he died.

Now AEG has a further bombshell — it claims to have ‘irrefutable’ proof that Michael is not the biological father of Prince or Paris, which they wish to bring to court.

Jackson family lawyers argue that the issue is irrelevant, and AEG is just seeking to embarrass the family.

Read more: Mail Online