Her bosoms, several million pounds' worth each, stand rounded and ever-perked as Melanie B contemplates a theatre production rail of suede, leather, rubber, denim, fur-trimmed, uber-glam, glittering style-wear. Erm, I'll let you put some clothes on, shall I? "You can watch me if you want", hoots the eerily-familiar, booming Northern timbre. "I don't care! Everyone's seen everythin' anyway..."

She is, of course, exactly as she is on't telly: strident, guffawing, grinning, confident, loud, instant. A bona fide pop superstar with no aloofness whatsoever. She accidentally spits in your eye when she's talking ("Oh noh! So-rreh!"), asks what else you've been doing this week and suggests you get your Arabic-lettering necklace "tattooed on yer, loov-leh". Her world comes with her, there's wee Phoenix, now 16 months old, paddling around the photo studio patting the photographer's bull mastiff terrier as she would a coudlesome cartoon Tigger. There's her nanny, her assistant, her best mate, her sister, her make-up artist, her hairdresser flown in from Paris. Two hours' sleep, a hastily-packed baby-bag ("and I didn't forget a thing!") And she looks stunning, bolting barefoot across the floor, flinging her enormous hair from side to side, tugging down a flimsy golden half-dress to half-cover her backside ("I'm not used to gerrin' this bit out...") And being all-over oiled by an enthusiastic pair of hands: "You're touchin' my vagina! You lesbian!" And she has, in the last year, had her spirit completely "crushed", is in the middle of a divorce and being asked to hand over millions of pounds to a man who persistently lied to her. And fallen in love again. And survived. It is, of course, Mel B and the Spice Girls' way. Invincible.

Next month, Mel B brings us Hot, her debut album of curvaceous R&B, with collaborations from Sisqo, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lexis (who were all "fantastic") and Teddy Riley ("a bit up his own arse"). People probably expect a belligerent, Kelis-styled emotional kaleidoscope. It's actually understated and vocally calm, despite the odd shriek during songs like, oh yes, "Pack Your Shit". Meanwhile, elsewhere in Spiceworld, Mel C is "very happy", both with her solo extravaganzas and, for today anyway, J from Five ("Good body", notes Mel B, "not my type, though...") While Emma's solo album is, apparently, "very soulful, like Aaliyah" and Victoria, of course, has "gone" UK garage with all the vim of a two-step vet. In November, the Spice Girls bring us their third album which, says Mel, is naturally "wicked, the bollocks, a bit more grown-up, the lyrics are a bit deeper, but very Spicey, still very girls-on-top, don't let yer feller mess with yer". She thinks the most popular female pop group in the history of recorded music will "last forever". Or more likely, "as long as we're wanted". Which may amount to the same thing.

Perched on a black lather settee upstairs in the photo-studio's open plan lounge area (now a toy strewn crŠche), Mel B's wearing nothing but a fluffsome white dressing-gown and a gigantic grin. She's not remotely concerned Victoria may have unsurped her position as Cool Spice via her two-steppin'. "It's not like that at all", hoots Mel. "None of us sits down and thinks, `What can we do that's cool and I wanna do it first?' She's a mate!" Don't you worry about Victoria's thinness? "No. `Cos she eats. When my auntie had her two kids she went down painfully thin, a lot more than Vicky..." Is the thinness because she's having astounding amounts of vigorous sex? "Heheheh... We all have a healthy sex life!" Does she ever talk about what a phenomenal shag David is? "I'm not gonna tell yer!" (Mel blares with her gleam-toothed grin, which is her way of saying "yes" while saying nothing at all) He must be. The man's an athlete! (With an even bigger grin) "I'm not sayin'! That's her private life. I can only speak for my own shag! But one thing is she does eat and she is healthy"

Mel B's marriage to Jimmy Gulzar, the Dutch break dancing champion and Spice dancer, lasted 16 months, from September 1998 to January 2000. Throughout, the tabloids deemed the relationship "fiery" and dubbed him "Jimmy Goldcard" due to his enthusiasm for shopping he brought to their brief nuptial non-harmony. All along, tabloid assumptions were made: he was an "unconventional" sexual Lothario who grew up, and worked, in Amsterdam, a famed "exotic" dancer in S&M PVC perv-wear and, allegedly, stifled by his new family life in the serene Buckinghamshire countryside, living in the shadow of one of the most famous women on earth. He was in it for the money. Or, as Mel might have put it, he was a manipulative, opportunistic celebrity love-cheat lyin' bastard. All over Hot there's direct lyrical references to a relationship gone horrifically wrong. The single, Tell Me, goes as far to say, "And all you loved was Mel B's money". Mention these lyrics and Mel actually beams, guffawing with laughter, her eyes boring into your own. Eyes which say, "It's all true" where her words say, "Diplomatic at all times". All he loved was Mel B's money? "I hate this question...", she chortles. "D'you know what, right, that song, for me, if I didn't feel as if it was true I wouldn't have written it".

So it is true.

"So that's my opinion", she counters. "When I wrote it I was very, very emotional, very upset, and this was my way of dealing with a pretty tough time. It was like, `I'm not going to be the fool anymore, you're going to be the fool and I'm going to make myself happy'. Not just for my sake but for my daughter. And she's the happiest I've ever seen her. She sees her Dad. She gets the best of both worlds. It's not an ideal set-up, but, y'know, shit happens". Mel doesn't, she insists, regret anything- not the lavish OK!-endorsed/semi-funded wedding, not being married to Jimmy in the first place. "Cos I've got a beautiful daughter and I've learned a lot. From all my relationships. And that's why I am the way I am now". She won't say what the arguments were about, but she says Jimmy wasn't comfortable with himself. Is it true he was bisexual?

"I've no idea. You'd have to interview him. At the end of the day, he's the father of my child, and that will never go away and we're on speaking terms because of that."

So you'll never do a tabloid expose?

"No. Coz of Phoenix. I've had a child with him. I got married to him. I fell in love with him. What am I gonna do? Turn around to my daughter and say `I hate your Dad'? I would never do that. No. I'm a parent, I've got a responsibility. She loves her Daddy and she will always love her Daddy. And I always want it to be like that".

Where is he now?

"He's living in Hampstead. And I'm paying for it. I'm paying for him to live".

So, to recap, he lied to you, married you for your money, was shagging other people in your house, that's what you're saying in your lyrics...

"Noooo! Oh, noh hoh hoh! Well, some of it's an exaggeration! He never shagged anyone in my house, I co-wrote that ("Pack Your Shit") with Teddy Riley. It's not all my story..."

What about you not liking Jimmy's "racy" Amsterdam pals?

"No! Y'know what?" (she chortles) "I'm bored of talking about him! I'm happy, it's the happiest I've been for a long time and I'm not takin' it lightly".

What's been happening with the three-mill?

"Well, obviously he's been trying to get money out of me, yeah. Which I see as my daughters money. It's her investment. I don't wanna say a figure but he's asking for a lot. I should've listened to my mother and signed a prenuptial".

Did he break your heart?

"I wouldn't say he broke my heart", says Mel after today's first and only lengthy pause. "He crushed....He crushed me. Y'know, like an Evian [mineral water] bottle. You can crush it and you can pump it back up and it's pumped back up through me and me only. And it's good now".

Some things about Mel B that are lies... Her "fling" with Goldie. They're merely "good mates", she goes to his club, they ring each other up, but all that "spotted in the Ivy restaurant kissing and licking each other" stuff was nonsense. Her position as Tory Spice and big pal of William Hague? She met him when she won the EMMA award (an appreciation of black, ethnic people) where she won Public Figure Of The Year. "He presented me my award and that was it", she blinks. "I'm not into politics, I think it's a load of old bollocks, a load of people fighting who just say summat and don't follow it up." Then there's the mooted film of her life... Which doesn't exist. And of course, her continuing "hatred" for Geri Halliwell: "We met a few weeks ago and it was lovely. We had our arguments, that wasn't an exaggeration, but you live and learn. You can't go around being aggressive and telling everyone off for no reason, which is what me and her did to each other all the time. We were like that, me and her. We spent three Christmases together, me and her on the beach. And she went off and did her own thing and we still talk and it's lovely. And that's how it should be with friends".

Things for Mel are indeed "all good now". She has Phoenix, her new boyfriend Max Beesley (the bongo-playing, Mancunian musician/actor who dated Melanie Sykes and Mica Paris), she has her friends, her family, a wonderland home in the country (where all the rooms have been "blessed" by a spiritualist) and a seemingly eternal career. The four Spices remain their own bosses, running their "Spice Office" in London from where their collective and solo careers are run. Mel doesn't live in The Met Bar ("been there twice") preferring "Tokyo Joe's and Ten Rooms, more underground, you get hassled less". She rarely complains about anything in hotels ("only the air-con, if it's too cold"), has very few celebrities in her mobile's phone book (Missy Elliot, Sisqo, Goldie, All Saints, Meg Mathew's), is neither "scary" nor, as she insists, "mad" and is, quite possibly, the most emotionally stable and self-assured 25-year-old woman in modern entertainment circa 2000.

Do you mind being called Air Miles Spice?

(Bemused) "Air Miles Spice? Why?"

You're always on holiday?

"I'm not! When these pictures are taken (topless in the sea in the tabloids, mostly) I'm either working or I'm takin' a two day break".

Rubbish

"I tell you now! When I was in LA I was working 48 hours with Sisqo on my album, gave myself a couple of hours off by the pool and bam, I get pictured and I'm on holiday again. The only holiday I have is when I'm in my house".

Did you show Sisqo your thong?

"No, I didn't. He's lovely, though, very sweet and talented, like a whizzkid".

You, Victoria and Donatella Versace out on a shopping spree. Who "wins"?

Probably me, because, right, when I go out buyin' I don't just buy for me, I buy for Phoenix, I buy for my friends, I buy for my boyfriend, for everybody an' all `is dogs".

What d'you buy for Max?

(Whispers) "See-through Gucci underpants. Hehehe! Nooo, I just buy him little love notes and things, like you do".

What on earth are love notes?

(goes all goofy) "Lovely little love notes and cards!"

You really fancy him, don't you?

(Beaming) "Meheheh".

Max is a Buddhist. Are you converting?

"I do try and meditate and I do a bit of Chi Gung... Or is it Tai Chi? Chi Gung.... And it's very calming and relaxing and I've got a little meditation room in my house. If you're a very energetic-givin' person, it's nice to just collect your thoughts and just get yourself centred."

Can you achieve the central goal, "transcend the self"?

"Well, for me it's not really Buddhism, it's just takin' time out."

So, for you, Buddhism is just "shutting the fuck up for ten minutes"?

"Yeah! Literally, it is! Meheh!"

Where d'you go with Max?

(goes all girly and coy) "Just out in the country, all private and lovely. We're both homebirds... (Phoenix ambles over) aren't we? Are ya dancin'?!"

What do you like about Max?

"He's a lovely person. Very honest and down-to-earth, an' he's a grafter. He's just a Northern guy. And I'm a Northern bird."

Good on the bongos, is he?

"I'm not sayin'!"

A professional on the bongos?

"He's great at what he does! Proffesionally-wise! Music, everything, he's great. I'm in a very healthy, happy relationship. Every woman deserves to feel like a woman, deserves to be treated well. And he does that for me. More than anyone I've ever been with.

One thing Mel likes best about being loaded is she can have whatever she likes in her home. Her bedroom is a work of art. It's around 40 feet by 30 with a deep-red carpet and floor-to-ceiling padded leather on the walls: "So it's sound-proofed... Meheheh". The bed is outrageous, the size of four king-sizers put together. Swathing all around it are gigantic billowing deep-red velvet curtains. And there's a low, low ceiling with a huge mirror positioned directly above the bed.

You didn't do that by halves, did you?

"I never do! It's very sexy, like a French boudoir, a lovenest. But you could read a book on the bed, too!"

You could play the flippin' FA Cup Final on it...

"Oh, I know! You could get about 20 people on it, I'd imagine, all star-fished".

What did Max say when he first saw it?

"I'm not tellin' yer! I'll tell you what my Mum said, she went `Oh God'. My Dad was like, `Oh Melanie!' Took one look and shut the door. It's tasteful, though, it's like a French... Harem."

D'you feel like the Lady Of The Manor in you big house in the country?

"In a stupid kind of way, yeah. I feel very lucky. To have achieved what I've achieved. And to be able to live where I live. There's not a day passes where I don't wake up an' go, `God. Wow".

Does it still feel ridiculous?

"Yeah. I walk down t'bottom of t'garden and I look back and go (humongous guffaw) `Woh-hoh-hoooaargh! That's mine...' I've worked hard and I don't take it for granted one iota".

Have you ever had wealth guilt?

(Midly suspiciously) "No. Not at all. Why should I get wealth guilt?"

Working-class guilt. Like Robbie. He's finally got his dream sports car and it's got S0R RY on the number plate.

"Oh, I wouldn't be sorry about that. I sort my Mum and Dad out, I sort my friends out, I sort my sister out. I've got nothing to be guilty about".

Some things about Mel B that are true... She's quite short, around five-foot-three and has a beautiful, lithesome, dancer's body. She's a "crazy Gemini" with a huge, dragon-y tattoo on her left shoulder blade and a Gemini tattoo on her left coxics. She works for ethnic charities and a battered-wives charity in Leeds. Some of her best friends are the same ones she's had since she was eight and, last night, she went to dinner with one of them, Rebecca, an actress: "I'd drop everything to make sure she's all right-and vice versa." She doesn't know nor care what the word "perpetual" means [continuos; ever-lasting]. She has a big, goofy Labrador called Lord. She shops, alone, in Waitrose. She thinks Eminem is "very funny, very clever, really talented, doesn't offend me at all, but then I don't scrutinise what he's saying, I'm more interested in a phat beat." She doesn't fancy being "impregnated" by him, mind; "Noh waaaay!" Mels' writing's tiny. She's autographing photographs for Skys' chums (aged 15 and 13). "All my love", she scribbles, intently, now glimmering in a super-glam suede and fake fur ensemble, cream stilettos clacking over the floor. "From Spice Girls. Mel B". The "B" is five times bigger than all of the other letters. Mel "G", most definetly, is history.