Elizabeth Hurley and I are sitting in the corner of a nightclub having a chat about music and books. We discover
thatwe like a lot of the same stuff-the Clash and Evelyn Waugh are particular favourites.But it's getting late and
the club -Sinatra's -is starting to empty. We're about to leave when, for reasons known only to ourselves, we
start nogging. She tastes of lipstick and apples, her hair smells of second-hand smoke and an unidentifiable
fragrance. At one point we break off and start laughing, then not knowing what to say, start snogging again.

Neither of us are particularly gifted snoggers, but what we lack in finesse we make up for in saliva. At the same
time, we're trying to be discreet; we don't want people to see us. She's wearing a white ruff-fronted shirt and
narrow black jeans. I've got on a black V-neck and some pinstripe trousers. After a decent enough period of
snogging has elapsed, I put my hand up the back of her blouse and discover that she isn't wearing a bra. It's all
quite thrilling. We decide to stay on for a while. I ask her if she's got a boyfriend and she laughs. Of course she's
got a boyfriend. I know she's got a boyfriend. I wonder what he'll think about her snogging another bloke and she
shrugs and looks at the floor. She doesn't seem overly concerned. Blow him. We go to the bar together and I offer
to pay, but in the interests of financial independence we agree to split the round. We drink lager and blackcurrant
and she says she particularly likes the record that is playing at the moment. I cock an ear in order to offer an
informed opinion. It's a strange but curiously compulsive song and I resolve to buy it tomorrow. She reminds me of
the title once more and this time I write it down. I've probably still got the piece of paper somewhere. "Zerox" by
Adam And The Ants.

Hang about ... Sinatra's. Ruff-fronted shirts. Lager and black. "Zerox". Elizabeth Hurley. This can only mean one
thing. It is 1980 and you, my son, are in Basingstoke.

It happened like this. I was playing the drums really badly - I was a guitarist - for a local band who may or may
not have been known asJunk Factory. We were post-punk and pre-posterous. Our songs had what we fancied to
be disturbing, Kafka-esque titles: "Girl On The Train"; "Postcard From Rome". We sounded like kiddie-menuJoy
Division, but cleverly concealed this by dressing so laughably that nobody would notice how musically inept we
were. This ruse appeared to work and, within a limited catchment area, people would tender good money to see
us play. One of these misguided souls was the i6-year-old Elizabeth Hurley.

Liz Hurley was very bright and into ballet and the Banshees. Despite mutinous skin and enormous eyebrows, she
was extremely pretty. She wore her hair dyed - peroxide or aubergine - and spiked and was given to sporting
home-made, leather miniskirts and tom, fishnet stockings. Misty-eyed men, now in their middle-thirties, remember
her as being "sexy as hell". With typical foresight, I fancied her mate.

Although she attempted to disguise it at the time, Liz Hurley was slightly posh and, rather unusually for the
supremely lethargic youth of suburban Basingstoke, unapologetically ambitious.

While the boys formed bad bands and dreamt of supporting KillingJoke at the Lyceum, Hurley put together an
all-girl dance troupe - saucily christened The Vestal Virgins - and went to work. Reassuringly for us
would-never-be rock stars, The Vestal Virgins were rubbish too, but you had to admire the girl's spunk.

At the dawn of the Eighties, Basingstoke had very little to offer the younger pleasure seeker. Computer games
were in their infancy and crack had yet to be invented, so come the weekend we would congregate outside
Woolworth's and, funds permitting, sniff a little glue. In the evenings, we'd meet in the gruesome boozers dotted
around the perimeter of the unlovely town centre and peacock about in appalling clothes, get drunk on budget
lager and, if the moon was high, get beaten up by men in pastelcoloured leisurewear.

In that time that time forgot, Basingstoke didn't have a great deal to be proud of An impressively high suicide rate
(topped only, if memory serves me right, by Stevenage), a massive mental hospital and more roundabouts per
capita than anywhere else in Britain. But it would be more than fair to say that it lacked a certain showbiz sparkle.


Elizabeth Hurley had just started sixthform college when she began to show up in the saloon bar of The Great
Western, a faded railway hotel tucked behind Basingstoke station. It sounds trite to say that she had something
special about her, but in a roomful of people who fully expected to become superstars as a matter of course, she
exuded an air of determined achievement. She had a plan: she studied ballet; she read books; she spoke about
having a career with a passion others reserved for planning a second nose-ring; and she showed only a fleeting
interest in excessive cider consumption. That, in Basingstoke, was classy. And that, I suppose, is why I kissed her
that night.

Sprawled languorously on an over-stuffed hotel sofa, Liz Hurley is animatedly reliving her past -and this particular
kiss'n'tell - with great glee. "Oh my God," she gurgles, "we snogged. We did! We snogged. How fantastic." She
suddenly freezes. "Did we have sex? Did we? No, we couldn't have because I would have definitely remembered."

That is very kind, madam, but not necessarily true.

"Now, the band you were in changed their name from TerminalJive to junk Factory," she gushes joyously. "I
remember so many details because those things were important to me at the time. Oh, this is heaven. I haven't
had a chance to reminisce for 15 years. I know all the trivia. Oh, this is so weird! Hold on, I'm going to ring my
sister, she'll know all this stuff "

She telephones her sister Kate ("Hello, trollop..."), who correctly identifies me as "that quiet bloke with a gloomy
green mac". A long, nostalgic discussion ensues, about people calledjill,jimi, Dickon and Dianne and a bloke referred
to only as "Beautiful Brian". This leads us inexorably to Hurley's lengthy list of unsuitable young suitors who were,
with the odd honourable exception, a revolting shower of losers, substance abusers and punchy psychos.

"Real yobbos," she frowns. "Thugs and bounders. I wasn't aware that some of them were into drugs because that
all went on behind closed doors. But a couple of the people I went out with were especially unpleasant. Real
scum. My mum was right about them. I should have listened."

And, of course, many former boyfriends have since sold their tawdry stories.

"Virtually all of them," she confirms grimly. "And it's very upsetting. In certain cases it is unforgivable. You can
understand people who don't have much money selling an old photograph of me with bleached hair, but some of
the stories have just been so... vulgar."

What of Septic, the tabloid-trumpeted protest punk, with whom she also stepped out?

"He never sold stories," she shrugs. "Never said anything horrid. Not that there was a great deal to reveal. He was
a very sweet, middle-class oyfrom Salisbury. He's a bom-again Christian now. Anyway, I haven't read the press
since my dad died in November 1996."

Has she seen knickers at half-mast photos of herself that appeared on the Net?

"What, with my hair in bunches?" she sighs. "Yes I have. I was on holiday in Cornwall in 1994. It's a horrendous
invasion of privacy and you can do nothing except stop living the life you want to live. You have to start sneaking
and creeping around. Then you think, 'I can't live like this' and try to broaden it out again but it's difficult. I had
people in my back garden in LA taking pictures of my'new fella' rubbing suntan lotion into my bottom. My hot'new
fella'turried out to be my poor, blushing little brother in his Speedo swimming trunks. He hadn't even told the
people where he worked that he was my brother and suddenly he's on the front of a national newspaper, virtually
naked, rubbing this gunk into my bum. He was devastated."

But isn't all this part of a deal she has made with the media?

"I'm always happy to make a deal which I think is fair," she says evenly. "If I attend a premiere to publicise a film
then people can take pictures and that's fair, but I don' think it's fair that photographers push my mum over in the
street to get to me. I don't think it's fair that they shut my pregnant sister in a taxi door to get to me and I don't
think it's fair that they train long lenses into my bathroom window."

It came as no surprise to many of us loafing oafs in Basingstoke when Liz Hurley succeeded - first, as a masterful
lo0- photo-opportunist and adaptable actress, then, most recently, as a shrewd movie producer. She was always
a doer.

Having moved to London in 1983, she tormented her agent and turned up to every tatty audition tossed her way.
She danced five nights a week with Bodyline ("named after the cricket thing not the sanitary towel"), the latest
incarnation of The Vestal Virgins. It was knackering but it paid the rent on her Chelsea bedsit, kept her in Marmite
and, eventually, secured her an Equity card.

All manner of costume nonsense and daytime, mini-series humiliation followed. "That was the lot of a jobbing
actress," she breezes. "I did adverts that I sincerely hope no one ever sees. Not that's there's much chance of
that happening now."

When Liz Hurley talks about "now", she means after May 1994, when she attended the premiere of Four Weddings
and A Funerd wearing Satan's first-aid kit.

"I honestly didn't think about it that much," she says referring to the dress formerly known as "That". "Because
you knew me before, you would have known that it wasn't a total personality change. It's how I've always
dressed. It didn't seem that big a deal. It was daring, but I've worn daring clothes since I was 12 years old. I've
always worn a ton of make-up and I've always had insane hair so I popped on the dress and... out I clattered."

Sipping a mid-aftemoon glass of Pol Roger and puffing on Silk Cut Ultra Lights in the aptly named Honesty Lounge
of this gentle Kensington hotel, Liz Hurley is in excellent spirits. At 33, having worked her shapely behind off for 15
years, she's looking good on it. She's kept her dancer's figure and the problem skin has stabilised possibly
something to do with having model for Estee Lauder these last five years. although it's heartbreaking to report the
mighty eyebrows of yesteryear gone. "My daddy liked them too," she says sadly before snapping to. "But they to
go. That's fashion, darling."

Dressed all in black with just a subtle touch of leopard skin, she is much the same girl she ever was: keen to
gossip; quick to laugh; meticulously precise with her figures, yet woefully prone to dramatic overstatement of
fact. When I ask who the real Elizabeth Hurley is, she takes a pensive draft of champagne before replying. "I really
don't know any more. You'd have to wake-up screaming and gibbering in the middle of the night get to that."

Her conversation fairly clanks with talk of staying in Cap d'Antibes; flying Concorde; firming-up imminent movie
deals with Castle Rock, and meeting Elizabeth Taylor ("I just s dribbling"). Yet she delivers these with the same
verve and self-deprecation that she does when she talks about h abiding love, punk rock.

"Before the Clash I didn't have records," she says. "Then I got into groups like Siouxsie [And The Banshees] and
X-Ray Spex, who I loved. I was too late, of course. It was well past time when they were hip because, in the
suburbs, we were light years And, rather pathetically, that's the I listen to now. It has to be said that I still
frequently listen to my X-Ray and Clash records."

And rap. Who could forget her i movie Dangerous Ground, in which shared the bill with the rapper Ice Cube "Mmm,"
she squints, realising that the piss is now officially being taken.

"It didn't make much money, that film. But enchanting fellow, the Cube. Very bright, extremely sharp. Very funny
too, and so good at his rapping. We got on well; we didn't exactly hang together, but all our scenes were fun.
And weren't his records fab when he started with NWA? I've got one of their records in my car right now."

Low-slung, very sleekand shit-off-a-shovel-swift, Elizabeth Hurley's car won't have come cheap. But then she's a
wealthy woman now. Were we back in Sinatra's, it would be her buying the lager and black. When she goes to the
cash dispenser, I wonder, does the display just say, "LOADS".

"Do you know," she laughs, "I don't actually have a cash point card. I rather wish I did. I've become almost like
the Queen now - I never have any cash. It's embarrassing sometimes. But I don't know exactly how much money
I have my net worth - although it would only take a phone call to find out. But I don't really buy much now. I'm
not fantastically materialistic. I don't spend much money. I've bought some property and I can look after my
family, which is a lovely thing to be able to do, but I'm not insanely money-minded."

But barring any disastrous business moves, presumably you're set up for life?

"I suppose I could stop working, but I wouldn't really want to. What would I do? I'm not very good at doing
nothing."

And as a film producer, are you a good saleswoman?

"I suppose I am. I used to sell double glazing as a Saturday job in Basingstoke. I got E8.50 a day so I must have
been OK. Then I worked in Owen & Owen [a department store], where they used to make you wear the most
frightful dresses. You'd be meeting a boyfriend after work and just be mortified with embarrassment if he saw you
in this horrific floral frock. In Hollywood I can sell something, but I hate selling something which I don't think is fair.
I can but I don't. Although, it's a complete myth that everyone in Hollywood is a halfwit. That's untrue. I've met
some phenomenally clever people there. I always find it's better to cut to the chase and see what you can offer
each other, rather than trying to pull the wool over someone's eyes."

Have you sold your soul to get where you are today?

"No, not at all," she says propelling a column of smoke towards the fireplace. "Purely because I don't think its
nessary in any of the businesses I'm in. You dont need to. No one's going to invest in you if you're not going to
make money and there's absolutely nothing you can do to change that."

Later in the Honesty Lounge, Hurley is defending Hugh Grant, her foppish beau of 12 years standing. The charge:
that he is a faux toff a middle-class chancer masquerading as a sub-blue blood. She speaks of Grant with deep, if
slightly resigned, affection.

"Both Hugh and I are pretty similar in our backgrounds," she says, perhaps not choosing the best moment to ease
a Gucci boot onto the table. "Both our dads were in the army and both our mums are still schoolteachers. Neither
of us grew up with any money, it was fish fingers and peas for supper and holidays in Devon as opposed to
Mustique."

Do you want children?

"Well, I'm not pregnant if that's what you're asking. But I think I will have children. It does sound kind of ghastly
to say that I'll have to wait until my life pans out. I guess it's a slightly more instinctive thing than planning it on
your calendar -'Today I'm going to put an hour aside to be creative!' - but I would one day like to have them,
although I'm not mad for babies."

If you were to have children would you have them with Hugh?

"Well, we've been going out for 12 years and if you can envisage your genes mixing in with their genes then that,
to me, is the real test. And I wouldn't mind my genes mixing in with Hugh's. I haven't met anyone else I wanted to
procreate with."

He's knocking on a bit though, isn't he?

"He's going to be 39 in September. He's not that old, is he?"

Has he put on weight recently? He looked a bit plump in Notting Hill.

"No, he's skinny as a rake. Hugh's always been thin. The thinnest I've seen him was after he did a movie in
Calcutta and he was phenomenally thin. He could get into my jeans which was a horror. But, compared to most
men on the street, he's a slim build. If he looks fat in Notting Hill it will be down to the director of photography."

You and Hugh seem to live in different countries. What's going on there?

"Well, we both only have one home, which is in Chelsea. During the last two years we've seen each other almost
every day because we've been working on the same movie [Hurley is the producer of Mickey Blue Eyes, in which
Grant stars] arm, that's been pretty good. Overall, I guess we've probably seen more of each other than the
average banker and his market gardener wife. We have been apart for lo periods, but then we've spent very long
periods together and an inordinate amount of time recently. Some people might think it's unwise to have so many
business interests tied up together beca our entire lives, business and personal, are tied up, but I like talking shop
and fortunately so does Hugh."

Doesn't he just play the same character over and over?

"Well, if a comedian is consistently funny," she says, her back stiffening," can often be thought of as just
repeating formula. But every joke is a new joke it has to be timed right."

The blow job issue. (Grant's regre exchange with a Hollywood hooker in 1995). Do you and he ever discuss that
now?

"I'd almost rather not talk about it to you either. As you're not family or a close friend, I'd rather not discuss it."

Were you very depressed after it happened?

"As I say, I'd really rather not..."

She trails off looking genuinely ups so we leave it. In fact, our time together almost up. She must go and select a
with which to upstage Julia Roberts at NottingHill premiere. I must purchase old Adam And The Ants single.

As she slips her sunglasses on, I tell that I read somewhere that she intends become a Catholic. Could that be
true.

"Not officially," she says cautiously.

"Not officially," she says cautiously. "My dad was a Catholic and my mother is an English Protestant. However, a
lot of my friends are Catholics and I have had some long chats to priests. And, obviously, I adore Graham Greene.
But I would like to be a Catholic and I'm I sure will become one."

The talk naturally reverts to Basingstoke which, it transpires, Hurley visited yesterday for her mum's birthday.
"Extraordinary place, really," she p "It certainly prepares you for the cruel world." She cracks a huge smile. "Christ
I can't believe we snogged. I'm going ring my sister again this evening and about this stuff for hours. It's been
absolute bliss to meet you again,"

Bliss, indeed. But swapping spit old-times' sake is patently off limi She departs instead with a firm han a tiny
curtsy and a knowing laugh. "Write something nice," she calls over her shoulder.

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