Anyone who grew up in a full house knows it’s never really quiet. Somebody’s always up, and the kitchen is where the real stuff gets said.
Prince Jackson knows that feeling well.
Prince is Michael Jackson’s oldest child, born Feb 13, 1997. When he was growing up in his grandmother’s care, home was Hayvenhurst, the Jackson family’s two-acre estate in Encino, California. The house once belonged to Michael himself. It has a 32-seat movie theater, a Japanese koi pond and the home studio where songs for “Off the Wall” and “Thriller” were recorded.
Prince gave a tour of that studio, and it’s the best way to step inside the house he’s talking about.
Prince Jackson shows the home studio at the family house in Encino
The grandmother in this story is Katherine Jackson, Michael’s mother. She was born May 4, 1930, which makes her 96 now. She raised Prince, his sister Paris and their little brother Bigi (called Blanket back then) at Hayvenhurst, and plenty of other relatives lived there with them.
How many? Prince did the math for the Los Angeles Times in 2016, when he was 19.
“It was beneficial. There was 16 people here.”
He listed cousins and relatives as he counted. He also called the home a “sanctuary.” And he said, “I’m very lucky to have two mother figures in my life,” and the first one he named was his grandmother.
You can guess how loud an ordinary afternoon got with cousins in every room. This real footage from April 2010 shows the kids out to lunch with Grandma Katherine and their cousins.
Prince, Paris and Bigi out to lunch with Grandma Katherine and cousins in 2010
So when did a house that full ever slow down enough for a real conversation?
Late. Very late.
“We’d wake up in the middle of the night, make quesadillas and talk.”
That’s Prince, in the same interview.
Quesadillas, in the Jackson house. The kids carried one of the most famous last names in music, and their favorite way to open up was to get out of bed in the middle of the night, fire up the stove and sit around talking. It’s about as ordinary as a family memory gets.
Most of us have our own version. Maybe it was grilled cheese or cereal at the kitchen table after everyone else was asleep. For Prince, Paris and their cousins, it was quesadillas.
Years later, Prince still sees that crowded house as a gift. Talking on Australia’s Sunrise TV show in 2026, he put it this way.
“I grew up in a big family, and so I have 40-plus cousins, and I see them as my siblings and my friends. And so I never felt lonely.”
Forty-plus cousins. No wonder the kitchen was busy at night.
Prince has done plenty of talking about his dad and his family since then. In this sit-down with radio station 102.7 KIIS FM, he opens up about Michael’s legacy and his own memories.
Prince Jackson talks about his dad in a radio interview
Keep those 16 people in mind while you watch. Prince is a grown man now, and he still talks about his cousins as his siblings and friends, the same crowd that once filled Grandma’s kitchen at night.