Wales wing Louis Rees-Zammit appears to be in the formative years of what you could quite comfortably predict will be a long and prosperous career as an international rugby player.
Though head coach Wayne Pivac left him out of some games during the recent Six Nations amid a dip in form, the speedster is now part of the furniture at the team's Vale Resort training HQ. But it wasn't always this way.
At the age of 18, having impressed for club side Gloucester, Rees-Zammit received his first call-up to the squad for the 2020 Six Nations. Pivac resisted the clamour to throw the teenager in and he didn't see a minute of game time during the tournament, but it proved a valuable experience as he got a taste of life in camp.
READ MORE: What became of the lost generation of Wales rugby stars who walked out
It was also a surreal moment as he rubbed shoulders with stars of the game that he'd grown up idolising, including Dan Biggar, who months earlier he'd taken a selfie with in a nightclub. Now they were team-mates.
Speaking on a Keep Wales Safe podcast, he said: "I got called up by Wales in that first Six Nations, which I didn't play in, but that was obviously an amazing experience to go into camp and see all the big dogs, if you like.
"Somebody made a TikTok - I put it on my account the other day - because when I was 18 I met Dan Biggar in club and I had a selfie with him. Then literally a year later I was training and playing with him. Now he's one of my best mates!
"It's pretty strange how life comes about. But it was an amazing experience, to go into camp for the first time.
"I was trying to play it cool, meet everyone and shake everyone's hands. But inside I was like: 'Oh my God, that's Alun Wyn Jones, that's George North. that's Leigh Halfpenny. These are all the people that I've been watching from when I was younger, going to the stadium and having selfies with [them].
"As soon as I came into the Welsh camp, they took me in with open arms. All the boys were so lovely to me. They all comforted me and just allowed me to do what I wanted in terms of training and expressing myself. Everyone was so nice.
"It helped me a lot because I felt like one of the boys even though I didn't have any caps. It was pretty amazing for them to take me in like that because it made it so much easier for me to train with them and play with them."
Rees-Zammit was capped later that year but really announced himself in the 2021 Six Nations. He scored crucial tries against Ireland and Scotland that kept Wales' title bid on course, though it was one score in particular that stood out.
His effort in the second half against Scotland, that saw him chip the ball over Stuart Hogg and regather before scoring, was voted try of the tournament. He finished the championship with four in total and it launched him towards a Lions call-up last summer.
"That was a pretty good game," he laughed. "It was absolutely freezing up there and it was a very tight game. I came out in the second half thinking I wanted to put more of a stamp on the game and credit to the boys, they gave me the space on the outside.
"When I got my hands on the ball, I kind of saw some space behind Stuart Hogg and then it all went in a split second. I put the ball on my foot, it bounced up for me perfectly. That was pretty amazing.
"After the game, I went on my phone and it's popping off with loads of messages. First I go to my family chat to see what they're saying. I think everyone in my family was crying, especially my mum anyway.
"Then I go on social media and it was pretty ridiculous to be honest. I was getting loads of followers from it, everyone was praising me and it felt amazing, like I was on top of the world for that day."
*Unlocked: COVID Stories from Wales is a new ten-part podcast series from the Welsh Government. The podcast has been launched as part of the Keep Wales Safe campaign and consists of five English language and five Welsh language interviews. Listen to the full episode here. *
