I'm not a bitch, honest

Myleene Klass's father likes to say that Hear'Say, the ill-fated pop band to which his daughter used to belong, was a bit like the Titanic: everyone was too busy dancing up on deck to see the iceberg coming. Klass, who is in the process of reinventing herself as a classical music star, flashes me a toothy grin. "This time around, I'm hoping for a nice, calm cruise," she says. "Being in Hear'Say is still the best thing that has ever happened to me - like being given a winning Lottery ticket - but it taught me a lot. The kiss-and-tells, the intrusion, finding out who your friends really are ... I'm only 25 but, sometimes, I feel like an old woman."

She may feel like an old woman, but she certainly doesn't look like one. In the flesh, she is delicious, even if her face has "been painted on" due to the fact that she has had only four hours' sleep. She has big, brown eyes and impossibly long eyelashes. Her skin is the colour of butter toffee, her waist the width of a stick of liquorice. In her tiny Miss Sixty jeans and orange vest, she could pass for a teenager. Recently, the tabloids announced that she is recovering from an addiction to fast food. If this is true, I say, a breathless nation awaits her dietary tips.

"No, it's not true!" she squeals. "I admit that I used to have a really bad diet, but it was more a case of eating what was accessible than an addiction. Listen, I have an Austrian grandmother; I know everything is going to go south in the end. But I don't mind. I've never set myself up as a model. From the beginning, I said: 'Come on, women. It's good to have curves, to have tits and a bum.' I've met some stunning people, but they haven't been happy. You must have more to offer than looks, otherwise you're just a cardboard cut-out."

Klass feels she has a lot more to offer than her looks (though her frustration at the world's "obsession with image" didn't stop her appearing in a tiny pair of bikini bottoms in FHM only the other month). But she also thinks that, in the music industry, a woman with a brain tends to be seen as a whole lot of trouble.

In the days before Hear'Say split last August, Klass found herself typecast as a bitch. She was the one who rowed with Kym Marsh (it was reported that the two had come to blows); she was the one who whispered in corners; and she was the one who stamped her pretty little foot when things did not go her way. Then, to top it all, after the band parted and she reached "rock bottom", she broke down on the Frank Skinner Show - an act she cannot recall without a shudder.

"If I was the person they all said I was, I wouldn't still be friends with the band," she says, briskly. "Neither would I have been signed up as a solo artist by another record company. No one wants to work with a nightmare. The trouble is, some people felt threatened, they didn't know where to put me. I am a postgraduate from the Royal Academy of Music; I'm into Egyptology and astronomy. But I also happened to be in a pop band. It was confusing. And when we were in Hear'Say, it was me who read all the contracts. Well, someone had to. If people interpret that as me being bossy, there's not much I can do."

Klass grew up in Norfolk. Her mother is half-Spanish, half-Filipino, and her father is Austrian (he was the captain of a North Sea freighter). The family was middle-class; Myleene and her younger brother and sister were even in a singing trio that became known as - wait for it - the Von Trapp Kids. She began playing the piano and her grandfather's violin at four and won a scholarship to the Guildhall after her A-levels, where she added the harp to her repertoire.

Hear'Say was formed on the back of the first big talent show-come-reality-TV series, Popstars. When Myleene, then a student, found out she had won a place in the group, the series' Svengali, Nigel Lythgoe, warned her that life was about to change forever. Did she believe him? No, she did not. "He said: 'You need to change your phone numbers'. But I just couldn't take the idea on board. How could I?"

But it wasn't an easy ride. The band was infamously booed at the Brits and hissed at in the street. For Klass, the worst thing about fame was the dreaded kiss-and-tell (she suffered at the hands of an ex-boyfriend). "That's horrible. There is a barrier between your boyfriend and your family, the two things shouldn't cross over. It's not normal for anybody's father to read things like that. I have been through it a million times in my head. Why would a person do that? Is it because they want the last word? Or is it just about money? I’m so paranoid now. If I’m sitting talking to someone, I’m scrutinising the room. I can’t help it. You never know who’s eavesdropping.”

Luckily, she now has a boyfriend who is able to cope with the trauma of reading all about hi girlfriend’s past loves of a Sunday morning; Klass has been going out with Graham Quinn, a former Hear’Say tour manager, for 18 months and they have bought a London flat together.

“If things were the other way round, I’d be freaked. But he’s fantastic.” How did they get together? “On tour. He turned me down the first time. He said: ‘If I’m going to get involved, this can’t be a fling. I don’t want to get my heart broken.’ Can you believe it? I rang Noel (also formerly of Hear’Say) in tears. It was agony. But the next day, Graham knocked on my door. He said: ‘I know you find it hard to trust guys, but now you’re going to find out how good it can be.”

Klass says that a lot of what was driving her during her Hear’Say days was that she was doing her dream job. “As for money, I’m jus grateful that I’m comfortable, that I’ve paid off my student loan.”
The band are still in “text city” right now, she says — by which she means close communication. “Suzanne is in a show, Noel is happy being at home, Danny is getting on with his life, he’s really happy.”

What about Marsh? Has she seen Kym since she left Hear’Say in January 2002, complaining that there had been so many rows between her and Myleene that she had ended up seeing a counsellor?
“No, but if I did see her, I’d be the first to shake her hand and say ‘well done’.” She is not at all surprised by the fact that her ex-colleague’s debut solo single went into the charts at number two. “I knew she’d do well. She has the voice, she’s got the talent, she’s worked hard. I wanted her to do it.

And now it’s her turn. In October, Klass releases her first classical album. “I want it to be tasteful,” she says. “There will be a twist, but it won’t be pop. I prefer the word contemporary. I want to make classical music accessible; I’m the first to admit that I can’t sit through a five-hour opera.”

Klass knew right away that she didn’t want to leave a band, you have a period of mourning. We didn’t all have breakdowns like the papers said, but we did feel low. When that was over, I was offered two pop deals. It was so weird. I wasn’t even tempted. Once, I would have been dancing on the table.”

She is off to think dresses now because she is presenting a prize at the Classical Brit Awards. “I’ve borrowed one from Kiri (Te Kanawa},” she says. “When they told me how much it cost, I nearly died. Thousands of pounds. If I lose a bead, I’ll be down on my hands and knees scrabbling around for it.”

She smiles nervously, shakes my hand and thanks me profusely for the interest I have shown in her career. Poor, misunderstood Myleene. I know she is a mite cheesy, but she seemed like a nice girl to me.