"Aplomb Marks Tour By Princess of Pop"

Walk inside the Fantasy Lounge - a dimly lit room with plush velvet
seats, black carpet, small trees adorned with fairy lights and platters
of sushi and pasta.

At a nightly cost of about $65,000 the Fantasy Lounge is the after-show
greeting-room for this decade's biggest selling artist, Mariah Carey, who
has, with very little fanfare, embarked on her first world tour.

Carey enters the room with the aplomb of a royal visit, as guests stand
aside in awe of the girl who has quite appropriately been dubbed "the
princess of pop".

Her career has taken off in the past five years at lightning speed and
Carey is approaching her world tour with much trepidation.  The first
dates on the itinery were in March with three concerts in Tokyo playing
to 150,000 people.  This month she is doing four select shows in Europe. 
But as for any more dates - including Australia - plans are still up in
the air.

It's not that Carey can't sell out shows, but the 26-year-old singer who
has sold 70 million albums worldwide has hardly ever performed live. 
Apart from a few live TV appearances, including MTV Unplugged show, Carey
has taken stage only live times in her career.  Her first concert, in
Miami in December, 1993, was savaged severely by the critics.

At her Japanese shows, her first since 1993, she confounded the critics
by delivering a skilled and polished performance.  But while she may have
been pleased at the response, Carey isn't about to embark on the
extensive rigours for a long tour.

If Carey acts more like a prima donna than a pop singer, it's probably a
lesson learnt early in life form her mother, who was an opera singer and
vocal coach.  She began training Carey's voice from the age of four.

While Carey never followed her mother's footsteps into the classical
world, she opted to follow the path of other musical heroes such as
Stevie Wonder and Aretha Franklin.

Encouraged by her mother, who gave her the appropiate stage name of
Mariah after a popular song in the musical Paint Your Wagon, Carey would
spend long hours in studios singing after school, often being late for
class after many late nights.

Music was also the anchor that stabilised her through a tough childhood. 
Her mother was white Irish American but her father was a black Venezuelan
and in the 60s their mixed marriage brought them hellish times.

"All sorts of crazy things happened - their car got blown up and their
dogs were poisoned," says Carey.  Her sister, Alison, who was ten years
older, was picked on the most because she has the darkest skin.

With racial tension a contributing factor, Carey's parents divorced when
she was toddler and her mother moved all over New York seeking work.  The
family moved 13 times in 14 years.

While Carey is reluctant to discuss her family problems - including a law
suit against her sister, who has led a dark life of drugs and
prostitution and has been diagnosed with HIV positive - she considers
herself lucky to have escaped a similar fate.

Her steely ambition drove her to move to New York at the age of 17, with
no money, sharing a one-bedroom flat with two other girls.  She wore that
same clothes and old pair of worn-out sneakers for a year as she hauled
her demo tapes around to record companies seeking the illusive big break.

A chance invitation to a party resulted in her meeting the president of
Sony Music Entertainment and one of the most powerful men in the music
industry, Tommy Mottola.  She handed him her demo and the Cinderella
story began.

In true Prince Charming fashion Mottola left the party, listened to the
tape in his car, rushed back to the party to find the anonymous singer
had already left.  After three days of searching he tracked Carey down
and told her in so many words her intended to make her a star.

Two years later, with no expense spared - the industry dubbed it the most
intense effort ever made by a record company to launch an unknown artist
- Mariah Carey emerged as Sony's new diva.  Her first single, Vision Of
Love, and debut album shot straight to the top of the charts in 1990 and
she has followed with five other chart-topping albums.

Though they tried to keep their courtship hidden, it soon became apparent
that the svengali and his protégé had developed a close personal as well
as professional relationship.  As Mottola (19 years her senior)
extricated himself from a messy divorce after a 20-year marriage, Carey
made plans for a lavish June 1993 wedding.

The wedding cost more than half a million dollars was.  And according to
Carey's wishes, it was meant to emulate the royal wedding Di and Charles.

Her marriage may have brought her certain privileges but it has made her
the target of cruel attacks.  "They call me the Queen of Sony," she
admits and there have been numerous reports of special treatment.

These reports make Carey's blood boil.  "Critics who have a problem with
my personal life - it's their problem.  Anybody with half a brain would
realise that it's the charts that count."