Ashton Layne Basil was born amongst the English wizarding community of Appleby to Bernard Basil, a dashing healer working in the Alchemy Room of St. Mungo's, and Annette Lock, a charming freelance magical portrait painter. Ashton's blue eyes are framed by long, strait, sandy blond locks.

Ashton lives in a cozy English cottage with her parents and two siblings. 10 year old brother, Eric Wane Basil, was blessed with their father's striking copper hair and blue eyes, while 8 year old sister, Isadora Daly Basil, affectionately nicknamed Izzy by her father and siblings, adopted their mother's warm blond hair and hazel eyes. The siblings had a happy childhood where they grew close and became each others best friends and confidants.

All three were homeschooled by a co-op of wizard parents who each taught different courses based on their own knowledge and talents. When she wasn't painting for her clients, Ashton's mother taught social history and art fundimentals. Ashton often missplaced assignments, but made high marks when tested on her application of skills since she at least DID the assignments. She developed a love of learning, and was especially attentive and passionate learning about the fundamentals of art from her talented mother.

Family feild trips and weekend outings with neighboring wizard families were a frequent occurrence. The Basil siblings especially loved group outings to go see the British and Irish Quidditch League games. Part of the fun for the wizard family children was the secret bets they made on their favorite teams with small personal items. Small items were agreed on so they could go undetected by their parents. Not as compettitive as their brother, Ashton and Izzy quickly learned not to bet any items too important to them. Disorganized Ashton already knew she would most likely lose track of her winnings anyway, but the betting was still fun. Ashton favored the Appleby Arrows, Eric, Puddlemere United, and Izzy, the Falmouth Falcons.

One sunny afternoon when Ashton was 5 years old, her family decided to have a picnic amongst a field of flowers. This is when Ashton's parents found out that she was allergic to pollen. This was also the day her parents knew that Ashton would be attending Hogwarts, for when Ashton made an especially large sneeze, the flowers around her jumped 3 feet into the air and fell back down to the ground. This was her first instance of magic.