On July 7, 2009 Shields gave a speech at Michael Jackson's memorial service. Jackson and Shields met when she was 13. They became friends instantly. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Shields said, “There were times when he would ask me to marry him, and I would say, ‘You have me for the rest of your life, you don’t need to marry me, I’m going to go on and do my own life and have my own marriage and my own kids, and you’ll always have me’.”