After his high-profile divorce from Elvis Presley's daughter Lisa Marie, Michael's mind turned to parenthood and being a better dad than his own father.
And in 1996, he married again, this time to nurse Debbie Rowe who was six months' pregnant with their first child, Michael Jackson junior, now 12.
Daughter Paris, 11, quickly followed. Mum Debbie later claimed: "It was artificial insemination. Paris was conceived in Paris, that's how she got her name. Michael wanted to call her Princess, but I thought that was stupid."
"After Paris, I couldn't have any more children. Michael was upset, he couldn't understand it. He wanted more babies."
They divorced in 1999, and Jackson took sole responsibility for the children.
His youngest, Prince Michael II, was born seven years ago to a surrogate mother Jackson never met.
Michael caused a public outcry in 2002 when he dangled his then nine-monthold son - nicknamed Blanket - out of a third-floor hotel balcony in Berlin.
"I used a surrogate mother for Blanket and my own sperm. I had my own sperm in my other two children," he later said.
He told the Oxford Union how he wished to be remembered by his own children after his death. "I hope my children will not judge me unkindly. I would like them to remember how I always wanted them with me, wherever I went, how I always tried to put them before everything else.
"But there are challenges. Because they are stalked by paparazzi, they can't always go to a park or a movie with me.
"As an adult, and as a parent, I realise that I cannot be a whole human being nor a parent capable of unconditional love until I put to rest the ghosts of my own childhood."
He concluded by saying: "What I am asking all of us to do is live up to the fifth of the Ten Commandments. Honour your parents by not judging them.
"That is why I want to forgive my father and stop judging him.
"I want to forgive my father because I want a father, and this is the only one that I've got.
"I want the weight of my past lifted from my shoulders and I want to be free to step into a new relationship with my father for the rest of my life, unhindered by goblins of the past."
Rain Walk Unmasked with Paris and Prince Michael I this month
Big Day Debbie Rowe and Michael's wedding in Australia in 1996
Father And Son A poignant moment between father and son
Masked All Paris and Prince Michael I at an LA farmers' market
Hidden Shopping at an antiques store in California
Cover Up Michael, two kids and his lawyer in Santa Monica, 2003
Doomed Love With Lisa Marie at Neverland in 1995
The kiss Michael and Lisa Marie at an MTV awards show in 1994