Looking at Travis Kelce, the last thing you’d expect is a crisis of confidence. The Kansas City Chiefs tight end and official boyfriend of billionaire singer Taylor Swift seems like he’s brimming over with self-possession, an appropriate demeanor for a guy who asked Swift out in front of his podcast’s vast audience. But according to his mother, Donna Kelce, the three-time Super Bowl champ felt the world go sideways when he met Prince William, Princess Charlotte, and Prince George this summer after Swift’s first Eras Tour stop in London.
The gridiron star admitted in June that he was intimidated when he met William following one of Taylor Swift’s Wembley Stadium shows. “Dude, he was the coolest motherfucker,” Kelce told his brother and fellow podcaster, Jason Kelce. But despite that coolness, Kelce “Wasn’t sure if I was supposed to like bow to them, curtsy, just be a frickin’ American idiot and shake their hand: ‘Sup, dude!’” he said. “We did want to be polite, especially since we’re on this side of the pond.”
Whatever he did, it worked. In his debut on Swift’s Instagram grid, Kelce posed for a photo with the singer and the royals, a broad grin on his face. (A second, Kelce-less photo ended up on William and Kate Middleton‘s shared Instagram account.) Since then, that interaction—as well as others Kelce has enjoyed as Swift’s supportive partner—have become part of the Kelce family’s lore, as much for its fame adjacency as for the vulnerability it brought out in the 6’5″, 250-lb athlete.
Those family conversations came up Friday, when Extra‘s Jenny Taft buttonholed Donna Kelce. “What can’t Travis do?” Taft asked his mother, noting Kelce’s Wembley turn on Swift’s stage.
“Well, he can’t clean. He can’t cook,” Donna began with a chuckle. “I don’t know if he knows how to paint or do pottery.” But in addition to those domestic or artistic tasks, Donna says her son sometimes struggles to feel at home around some of Swift’s biggest-name fans.
Meeting William, Charlotte, and George “was probably one of the coolest things,” Kelce told his mother. But it didn’t come without a helping of imposter syndrome. “He said that when you meet people like that—you know, when the royals come in, or Paul McCartney or Hugh Grant or something like that…you’re just like ‘who in this picture doesn’t fit? Why am I here? And why am I even allowed to talk to these individuals? This just doesn’t seem right.’”
Lest you worry that Kelce is overwhelmed with anxiety, Donna hastened to add that he’s handling meetups with living legends pretty well, all things considered. After all, she said, “he’s a pretty friendly guy.”
