Meghan Markle turns to Serena Williams for advice

Meghan Markle has reportedly turned to long-time friend Serena Williams for advice on how to deal with online trolls.

Markle, 37, is due to give birth to her first child with Prince Harry in late April and since her May 19 wedding, has been under the spotlight.

The Duchess of Sussex became a victim of her own family, with her father Thomas Markle, half-sister Samantha Markle and other family members giving paid interviews about their childhood and alleged mistreatment of her father.

It's been reported that the Kensington Palace PR team is having difficulty dealing with the sheer number of nasty comments being posted on their official social media accounts.

"Meghan's obviously had some horrible trolling, plus people keep speculating about her relationship with Kate so Serena feels she needs the 'big guns' behind her to set the record straight, and shut everything down," a source tells Express.

Meghan's team has allegedly been resorting to manually removing negative comments on social media, with reports the Palace has reached out to Instagram for help.

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Some of the comments are said to have been racist and sexist.

"It was pretty vile for a while," a source told the Daily Mail. "There are automated tools which help police the very inappropriate comments getting through, but there is also manual moderation.

"The trouble is there are often thousands of comments."

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Markle and Williams have been friend for the past eight years, since the Duchess lived in the US and was starring in hit TV show Suits.

Williams attended the Royal Wedding and told PEOPLE in December, 2017, that Meghan frequently checks up on her.

"I'm like, 'How are you?' and she's like, 'No, how are you? and I'm like, 'You're so sweet, but I'm really asking, how are YOU?'

"I'm like, 'Meghan, stop being so nice you're the pregnant one, aren't you suppose to have hormones, why are you so sweet?' But that's always been her."