TODAYthe Queen will become the longest-reigning monarch in British history.

The previous longest-reigning monarch was the Queen's great, great grandmother, Queen Victoria.

In recognition of this fact, the Queen has requested that any celebrations be low key.

In Warwick today, the Warwick Branch of the Royal Society of St George welcomes you to have a drink to her health and stop and have lunch with the club at the Warwick Hotel.

The Queen is a constant in a changing world and many of us have known no other monarch.

Many of us still hold true to the oath as school children we recited at assembly parade.

We would salute the flag, sing "God save the Queen" and recite the oath.

"I honour my God, I serve my Queen, I salute my flag."

We would then march into school to the tune of the Colonel Bogey march. Sadly we are presently in an era where regard for the Queen and the Flag and even respect for the Nation itself are things of the past.

However, whatever your views, you cannot but admire the Queen for her devotion to duty and we should never underestimate the Queen's dedication to, and affection for, her Commonwealth family. To mark her Diamond Jubilee year of 2012, the Queen did not want memorials to commemorate the past; she wished to create a much more human legacy. Thus, The Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust was founded. With her active approval and support, programmes have been established to end avoidable blindness. The global action plan is to end preventable blindness, including trachoma which still exists in Australia among indigenous communities. Australia is the only developed country in the world to still have the disease.

As Defender of the Faith, she has been Christianity's most devout public advocate, often shaming her bishops, and it is acknowledged she does not have a racist bone in her body. Her self-command or stiff upper lip is to many a virtue, but in a touchy-feely, confessional age can be a liability. The greatest crisis of her reign, following the sudden, terrible death of Diana, Princess of Wales, arose from the perception that she was unfeeling. "Show us you care, Ma'am" was the cry from the press, a lesson which was heeded as can be evidenced by her tears after 911 at the memorial service in London.

The Queen, who will be 90 next April, last year, carried out a staggering 393 engagements. We tend to take this for granted, but at the Cenotaph in London on Remembrance Day it was commented that there are not too many very old ladies who could walk backwards down steps by themselves without even looking. As it was commented by Allison Pearson in the Telegraph "It's because she has so rarely let us down. It's because, to us, she is not old, nor allowed to be. She is just the Queen. A still point in a tumultuous world, the clock face over which the hands of time revolve, she has been with us for as long as we can remember."

Often referred to in our press as Britain's Queen, it is conveniently overlooked that she is our constitutional monarch. The Queen, by convention is not involved in the day-to-day business of the Australian Government, but she continues to play important and symbolic roles, as do her vice-regal representatives. The Queen's relationship to Australia is unique. In all her duties, she speaks and acts as Queen of Australia, and not as Queen of the United Kingdom.

The Queen's Royal style and title in Australia is Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, Queen of Australia and Her other Realms and Territories, Head of the Commonwealth.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, if you can't come along to the Warwick Hotel, around drinks time pour yourself a tipple and raise a glass to those mind-blowing 63 years and 216 days and to the best Queen a nation could wish for.