In age of Age of Empires 2 on hard or hardest does the AI cheat or get a resources advantaged? If not explain ?

In Age of Empires 2 The Conquerors Expansion, I have been playing on hardest on random map and I noticed the Computer players are able to advance through the ages very quickly and building units and structures very fast, much faster than I can playing almost flawlessly. I decided to watch the game with all the map visible. The AI constructed 3 houses, a mill, a lumber camp and 3 farms, without chopping any wood. The starting wood was 200…to little to build that much. I tried myself with same civilization and its impossible to do…