IT was September 1980. Squidgy" had yet to become a telephonic term of endearment, and 19-year-old Lady Diana Spencer, Prince Charles's love interest, was a paragon of innocence. A photo op ended that. Posing with two tots at London's Young England Kindergarten, where she was an assistant, shy Di was unaware that, backlit by the sun, her skirt had turned transparent.

The resulting photo of the soon-to-be-royal gams made Scarlett Dyer, the 3-year-old clinging to Di's left hand, a mini-celebrity. (The other child's identity is unknown.) "The papers harassed me at school," Dyer says. "The teachers got stressed out about that." Not so Dyer. Now 17 and a final-year student at a London private school, she is an aspiring actress and a member of the exclusive National Youth Theatre. She hasn't spoken to Diana since the famous photo, but she does have a souvenir: Though Dyer didn't attend the wedding, the Princess sent her two keepsake slices of cake. "It's going off now," Dyer says. "The cake's shriveled up. Still," she adds, "it's a nice memory of it all."