We don’t need to know what cancer she had,” said one woman who spoke to Kate on Tuesday. “We just know she’s been through surgery, she’s been through chemo—and one year later, my goodness, look, she is here.

"It was just like talking to a friend about a really horrible time in life and how you find ways of getting through it," Katherine Field tells PEOPLE of the Princess of Wales

Middleton announced a new role as Joint Patron of The Royal Marsden Hospital, where she underwent chemotherapy last year.