Inside Prince's Life in the Jehovah's Witness Congregation Where He Was Called Simply 'Brother Nels
Prince, the enigmatic and renowned rock star beloved by millions, was just another devoted member to the congregation of the St. Louis Park, Minnesota, Jehovah's Witness Kingdom Hall. Known to member Anna Barry as simply "Brother Nelson," Prince (whose real name was Prince Rogers Nelson) was "in good standing," and would go door-to-door with the ministry, she tells PEOPLE. "He [witnessed] in the beginning," Barry explains. "He had a very special territory. He was able to talk to those who the rest of us would never be able to talk to – celebrities, for example." Prince, who died on Thursday at age 57, regarded the Kingdom Hall as a "safe place" and a "haven," Barry says, and toned down his famously colorful style around the congregation. "He would just have a suit and tie. You wouldn't have picked him out," Barry says, adding, "You wouldn't have picked him out [from the rest of the congregation]." Prince converted to the Jehovah's Witness religion in 2003, and, with it, "found fulfillment," a church spokesperson said in a statement to PEOPLE. Barry says that she last saw Prince at a service on March 23 (looking "absolutely normal") for the Jehovah's Witnesses' Memorial of Christ's death – a sacred day in the church. "I was standing in the back and facing the door and waiting for someone I'd invited, and I was standing there talking to a Brother, and Prince had been at meetings at a couple different locations," she shares. "I was just standing there and all of a sudden, in he walks. I thought, 'He just wants to be treated like an average person,' so I just kind of acknowledged him, and he came in and sat down.".