Meet Ashleigh Hale: Meghan Markle's niece who was wasn't invited to her and Prince Harry's royal wedding

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex's Netflix docuseries, "Harry & Meghan," premiered on Thursday with the first three episodes. The docuseries explores the couple's relationship, from their first meeting on Instagram to controversies and their eventual decision to step back from royal duties. The final three episodes of "Harry & Meghan" will premiere on December 15.

The third episode introduced audiences to Meghan's niece, Ashleigh Hale. While some of Meghan's other relatives have discussed her publicly, the docuseries is the first time Hale's spoken about her relationship with Meghan.

Here's everything we know about Hale, so far.

Hale said in the docuseries that her biological mother is Samantha Markle, previously known as Samantha Grant. Samantha became a vocal critic of Meghan after the duchess was linked to the British royal family and Prince Harry.

Hale said she and her brother lived with their paternal grandparents as children.

"My biological mother is Samantha Markle," Hale said in the docuseries. "It was agreed by everyone, by myself and my brother, to be raised by our grandparents. They got custody of us when I was probably around two years old."

Hale added that she considered her paternal grandparents to be her parents.

"Ultimately, they did adopt us. I was raised by my paternal grandparents, and for me, they were my parents," she said.

Meghan shared that after her father, Thomas Markle, told her Samantha reconnected with Hale, she asked for Hale's email address so she could reach out. The aunt and niece hit it off, talking to each other several times a week and going on vacations together.

Photos of the pair, who call each other "Meg" and "Ash," showed their bond, highlighting moments from their trips and Hale's wedding in the series.

"I think she takes on a lot of roles for me. There's a sister element, there's something maternal," Hale said of her relationship with Meghan. "She's a best friend, she's kind of all the things."

Meghan told "Harry & Meghan" viewers that Hale was "put through quite a bit by the media, just by association."

Hale said that her biological mother started making negative comments about Meghan to her once news of Meghan and Harry's relationship broke. She also added that she stopped talking to Samantha altogether.

"After the news first broke, Samantha pretty quickly began expressing a lot of angry words about Meg towards me. What was communicated to me was maybe some resentment," she said. "And it felt like no matter what I said, you know, her perspective didn't change and seemed to get angrier and bigger."

In the lead-up to Harry and Meghan's wedding in May 2018, Hale said contact with Meghan became less frequent and she assumed the couple's relationships were being "managed on some level."

Harry noted that their small press team at Kensington Palace, which was combined with Prince William and Kate Middleton's office, was dealing with a "huge undertaking" at the time. Meghan revealed in the show that the team advised her not to invite Hale to the royal wedding because it would be difficult to explain why Hale was invited and Samantha wasn't.

"I was in the car with H, and I called her and I had her on speaker phone and we talked her through the guidance we were given and why this assessment was made," Meghan said. "And that's painful.

Hale said the decision was hard for her as well.

"I think I said I was hurt on some level, but I understand where it was coming from," Hale said. "To know that it was because of my biological mother, that this relationship that's so important to me was impacted in that way. To feel like because of her it was taken away was hard."

Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, and representatives for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.