It is tempting to try to categorise the Commonwealth. A French diplomat once told me that he thought that it was like a club. Like a club the Commonwealth has a wide range of activities in which members take part on a voluntary basis. Like a club the members take part on an equal basis without any particular member or members having special privileges. But the Commonwealth is also more than a club.
Most clubs focus on recreational activities.
The Commonwealth focusses on all the most difficult and important issues in the modern world and tries to find ways in which it can contribute to their solution. So I think that Her Majesty, as so often, was correct. It is probably because of this informality and diversity that the Commonwealth will continue to flourish in this new century, if not for the whole of the new Millennium.