President Hillary?

It was billed as the moment when Hillary Clinton opens her heart. But all that the most controversial woman in American politics revealed was the depth of her political ambition.

In a one-hour exclusive interview shown on US television, the former First Lady touched briefly on her husband's infidelities before concentrating on what many suspect is the real reason for her £5million biography Living History - setting the stage for her own White House plans.

Showing a politician's skill for deflecting troublesome questions, Senator Clinton's first in-depth discussion of her private life turned into a finely tuned party political broadcast.

And in a direct appeal to the values of middle America, she told veteran interviewer Barbara Walters that her faith in God had sustained her in difficult moments. She spoke of getting down on her knees to pray.

In the coming weeks, Mrs Clinton will set out on a promotional book tour that could help sell over one million copies. But, more significantly, it could put the memories of past scandals such as the Whitewater land deal behind her. Many political observers believe that her long-term plan is a run for the White House in 2008, when President Bush, a virtual certainty to win re-election next year, will be forced to step down under US law.

For the moment Mrs Clinton remains coy in public about her future. She was "flattered" by talk that she might return to the White House - this time in the Oval Office. She said last night: "I hope that it will lead to a woman running for President and we have a lot of good women." She insisted: "I don't have any intentions or plans of running."

Few will have believed her, any more than her claim that she genuinely first believed the early stories about Monica Lewinsky and her husband were "just extraordinary, outrageous accusations, and I knew they weren't true".

In her book, which is published today, Mrs Clinton tells of life with Bill Clinton, meeting the Blairs... and a baffled mother-in-law.

Early ambitions

In their early days she never dreamed that Clinton would end up in the White House. Although people have said she used to go round saying he would be President, she does not remember thinking that until years later. However, there was a strange encounter at a restaurant near where they lived in Berkeley, California. Late for meeting her husband, she asked the waiter if he had seen anyone who looked like Clinton. "A customer sitting nearby says, 'He was here for a long time reading, and I started talking to him. I don't know his name, but he's going to be President some day.'

"'Yeah right,' I said, 'but do you know where he went?'"

Bill's mother

Mrs Clinton's relationship with the President's mother Virginia did not get off to a good start.

"We were each bewildered by the other. Before Virginia arrived, I had trimmed my own hair (badly) to save money. I didn't use make-up and wore jeans and work shirts most of the time. I was no Miss Arkansas and certainly not the kind of girl Virginia expected her son to fall in love with. No matter what else was going on, Virginia got up early, glued on her false eyelashes and put on bright red lipstick. My style baffled her, and she didn't like my strange Yankee ideas either."

Whitewater

As the Whitewater scandal unfolded in early 1994, Mrs Clinton reveals how her husband sank into the depths of despair. To make matters worse, his mother died. "Bill was worn out and exasperated. He was heartbroken about losing his mother, the one steady presence throughout his life. 'I don't know how much longer I can take this,' he said."

The Blairs

The Clintons got on well with the Blairs after being introduced by mutual friend Sid Blumenthal who told Hillary that they were political soul mates and had to meet each other.

Their first encounter was at a reception for Tony Blair in 1996. Mrs Clinton says she and the future Prime Minister were "locked in conversation about politics and public policy in our respective countries. I instantly felt a connection".

The following year, after Mr Blair had won the election, Mrs Clinton was invited to Chequers. "Tony met me at the door wearing blue jeans and his trademark boyish grin... that evening, the Blairs and I enjoyed a private dinner and stayed up late into the night, sitting in front of the large stone fireplace in the Great Hall, talking about a broad array of subjects."

Marriage guidance

As the Lewinsky crisis worsened, Mrs Clinton writes: "Bill and I had agreed to participate in regular marital counselling to determine whether or not we were going to salvage our marriage. On one level, I was emotionally shell-shocked and trying to deal with the raw wound I had suffered. On another level, I believed Bill was a good person and a great President."

She writes: "There is nothing remarkable about getting up and going to work every day, even when there is a family crisis at home. Every one of us has to do it at some time in our lives." Their regular counselling sessions, she said, "forced us to ask and answer hard questions that years of non-stop campaigning had allowed us to postpone. By now I wanted to save our marriage, if we could".