‘Would Your Majesty like to dismount here, or would you prefer to be dropped off closer to the entrance?’ I asked Queen Elizabeth II.

Her dirty look was all it took for me to realise that my question was completely inappropriate.

First, I should have addressed the monarch in the third person: ‘Would Her Majesty…’ Second, why did I think that a frail woman in her nineties would elect to walk from the middle of a car park to a building’s entrance when there was the option of being driven to the door?