This week marked the 10-year anniversary of iconic singer Prince's death and his ex-girlfriend Jill Jones shined a light on their complex relationship that left her finding him "loveable and hateful" at the same time. The songstress shared a close professional and personal relationship with Prince - they both worked on the 1999 album and Purple Rain.

The 63-year-old spoke to Mirror in an interview and recalled a time when Prince violently attacked her and repeatedly punched her in the face. The incident, she said, happened in 1984 when she took a friend to see Prince at a hotel. She caught him kissing her friend, which triggered her into slapping the musician. Prince, she claimed, then punched her over and over in the face.

She told the Mirror: "Had I come forward…it wouldn’t have happened. But basically, after that, we made up because I had a surgery and he gave me a ton of toys, and this is how the apology was: balloons, toys and candy. It was really hard for us to not be around each other. He always thought I would be there. He would always say: ‘I’m always gonna know you.’"

Jill said it was a time when "men did knock around their wives" and after the incident, she was waiting for an apology but eventually she walked away and decided to rebuild her life in Europe. Just a few weeks before Prince died, Jill met him at an after-party in the US.

"I did want to see him, and I was nervous...He was so thin and so little. I said 'Oh my God. I hope we’re not coming to his funeral next'," she added.

Later she heard the news of Prince's death on television, she was devastated that they were not able to reconnect again. Last year, the Prince estate blocked the release of a nine-hour Netflix documentary about Prince due to concerns over sensationalised content.

Jill said her intention of sharing the details of domestic violence was to "talk about the man as he is".