Queen Elizabeth 2 was born in December 1960. Her mother, the first Queen Elizabeth had 2 shiplings before her. The first was sickly and died just a few days after he was born. The second, dubbed Q3, was deemed unfit for service by Cunard who wanted a cruise ship hybrid rather than a pure ocean liner. She was given to a rival line and raised in secret before becoming the Oriana of 1959, mother to the current Oriana of P&O Cruises. Q4 as QE2 was known for much of her early life was born 10 weeks early as she had been expected in February of the following year. Born weak and sickly, Cunard had little hope for the shipling and had originally planned to put her down. But at Queen Elizabeth's urging, they decided to give the runt a chance. Suffering from a hole in her heart (common in premature babies) and bleeding in the brain which can cause cerebral palsy, QE2 fought for life her first few weeks. Once she had gained enough strength to be taken off supplemental oxygen, she was given to her mother who was pulled off the transAtlantic route in order to better care for her sickly child. QE2 developed slowly. It wasn't that she had trouble understanding, in fact to this day her photographic memory remains the most impressive ever documented, but due to the health problems she had, particularly with her brain, she just couldn't apply them. Cunard began to lose hope in the fast growing liner but QE2 refused to throw in the towel.

Her saving grace came in 1965 when, just half a year after she started school, QE2 started receiving lessons from an unusual tutor. HMY Britannia rarely took on a protege and when she did it was typically an important military vessel such as the child of the flagship. But Britannia had unique methods that ended up being just what QE2 needed. She began teaching QE2 in secret, with no one but the high officials at Cunard and Queen Elizabeth knowing. Recognizing QE2's abilities to memorizing everything she saw and heard, Britannia began lessons where she would have the young ship recall what she knew. Within 6 months, QE2 was improving dramatically in her schooling. The recall helped fire the neural pathways in her brain that were meant for application. Where before she could only listen and recall things, now she could use that knowledge to apply it herself. 9 months after Britannia started her sessions, QE2 spoke her first word. Most ships learn to speak before they're a year old, QE2 took 6 times as long but the wait was worth it. It was 1966 and Queen Elizabeth was about to be taken out of service. According to her surviving sister, Queen Mary, she had said then "It was the best farewell present I could have ever received." QE2 was the last shipling ever produced by Queen Elizabeth and the last shipling produced by a Cunard Queen until Queen Mary 2 and Queen Victoria were born in 1990.

QE2 was pressed into service at a very young age, just 9 years old in 1969. She wasn't full grown yet, still just a teenager. But she had progressed enough that Cunard felt confident in their new flagship. Even so, her mother was weary. QE2's brain troubles had miraculously healed but the hole in her heart remained. Though not troublesome under normal circumstances it could become life threatening if she was pushed too hard. Thus, Queen Elizabeth successfully lobbied Cunard to allow rival P&O's Canberra to act as a nanny to the young ship. It was an agreement that QE2 disliked at first but she came to like and according to some accounts, adore Canberra going so far as to call her "Aunty Berry".

QE2 continued to defy the odds, surviving her first 10 years of service without a scratch despite some protractors convinced of her going to the scrapyard before that point. But her greatest test was yet to come...