How Taylor Swift and Blake Lively’s long-lasting friendship began with a very AWKWARD MISUNDERSTANDING

Taylor Swift and Blake Lively have been close friends since 2015, but it hasn’t always been that way.

The pair have recently started spending more time together after the Cruel Summer hitmaker turned the latest Kansas City Chiefs game into a celeb-spotting exercise as she invited a host of her A-list mates to cheer on her new boyfriend, Travis Kelce.

Swift’s section at MetLife Stadium was bursting at the seams with Hollywood stars including the likes of Blake and her husband Ryan Reynolds, as well as Sophie Turner.

But Taylor and Blake’s friendship was nearly derailed after fans misunderstood a harmless social media post made by the Gossip Girl actress.

In September 2015, Blake made an innocent comment, which angered several of Taylor’s fans.

The Gossip Girl star infuriated Swifties when she seemingly made fun of Taylor’s famous ‘squad’ of female friends.

Sharing a photo of herself alongside John Legend, Julianne Moore, Naomi Watts, Karlie Kloss and others for a L’Oréal campaign, Blake joked in the caption: ‘Soooo, turns out this WASN’T a video shoot for John Legend’s cover of Bad Blood.

‘@lorealparisofficial blew it out for this one. My #pinkobsession is exposed now. Ok your turn. I won’t tell! #AlsoTurnsOutJohnLegendIsntCoveringBadBlood Time to start a petition!’

Despite the innocent nature of the comment, some of Taylor’s more diehard fans took it as shade towards the songstress.

Blake quickly shut down rumours of a feud by revealing that she’s always been a huge fan of the singer and posted an Instagram photo of Taylor posing with the actress’ family backstage during her 1989 tour.

‘Umm whoever thought I was throwin’ shade clearly doesn’t know I have a “Taylor Swift Please Be My Wife Voo Doo Doll,”‘ she wrote, adding “#obsessed”.

‘Look how rad she is here making my niece Heather feel like a rock star. Love my Canadian family almost as much as I love Taylor Lively. I mean Swift. Ok, FIIINE we can hyphenate our last names. Xo Blake Swift-Lively 4eva.’

Taylor then shared a snap of the pair hanging out at the Warner Bros. Movie World theme park in Queensland during the Australian leg of Taylor’s 1989 tour.

Yesterday was such an amazing day off – roller coasters, kangaroos and LOLs with @blakelively See you tonight, Adelaide!’ Taylor captioned her social media image at the time, in which the pair are leaping in the air.

Days before the outing, Blake was spotted by fans at Taylor’s Brisbane concert.

A Snapchat video and series of tweets from fans suggested Blake, who was filming The Shallows in Queensland in 2015, was in the audience at Suncorp Stadium for Taylor’s second Australian show during her 1989 World Tour.

It was not until the summer of 2020 that the parents gave Taylor the honour of revealing their daughter’s moniker to the world through her song Betty.

The hit was featured on her eighth studio album Folklore. Fans quickly put the pieces together after hearing the names of Blake and Ryan’s other two daughters in the song.

Ryan previously revealed that their children had no clue Taylor was famous after growing up with her in their lives.

He admitted on Sirius XM: ‘I think what’s most exciting for them is that for the longest time they just thought Taylor’s just like an aunt, like a friend of Mommy and Daddy that’s very, very close, almost family.

‘And then they went to a concert one day and were like, “Ohhhhh, this isn’t a hobby.”‘