Tiffany Lane has got a story to tell - stories, actually. Like the time that, while in high school, she got arrested by federal agents for running credit card scams at a Philadelphia mall. And the time she flew through the windshield of a rental van driven by Junior M.A.F.I.A.'s Lil' Cease, lacerating her head and breaking her ankle. And the time she snuck a ponent bag on "Branson" weed into the hospital for her cancer-stricken father. There are stories like these, filled with pain or fear of turmoil. And so Lane, a.k.a. Charli Baltimore, shares them this winter night. Her purple Navigator parked outside of an ice cream shop in New York's Chinatown, the 25-year-old woman-child sings her sad songs.

"I was getting ready to be out," she says, recalling a 1997 suicide attempt two days after her boyfriend - the Notorious B.I.G. - was shot to death. A depressed, grieving Charli overdosed on Valium and sleeping pills. She had to be rushed to the hospital. "I was like, 'F it, everybody I loved died. What do I have to live for?'" She survived, though. Just as she survived the accidents, the teen pregancy, the death of her daddy. Given these, Charli's not the least daunted by her current challenge: winning over a skeptical hip hop audience.

Critics question her skills as well as her credentials, insisting she's merely riding the wave of her deceased boyfriend's popularity. Some of the criticism stems from her 1998 pop hit, "money." Bolstered by a smaple of the O'Jay's overused "For The Love Of Money," the song became one of radio's guilty pleasures last year. But the song also compelled many heads on the street to dismiss Charli as just another would-be ice queen. Even Charli - whose devotion to hardcore hip hop once earned her the MC nickname "Tifflon" - seems dismayed by the perceptions generated by the song. "'Money' was the most annoying song," complains the Philadelphia native. "It's one of those Marky Mark 'Good Vibrations' joints. [My label] wanted me to go in that direction, but I didn't want to. I was like, 'Yo, I'm Mobb Deep. I'm underground. That's where I'm from.' But [people] look at you and get a whole other perspective. They get caught up in you being a girl."

Charli's hoping to erase the misconceptions with her debut LP, Cold As Ice, which is slated for release on Untertainment Records this year. It's a gallant, self- written, revealig lyrical effort. Songs such as "They" and "Pimp Da 1 U Love" are painful narratives in the Donny Hathaway tradition. Perhaps the album's strongest track, "Have It All," is a tribute to four people in Charli's life ho have passed on. The story, on record and in reality, goes like this: Her father dies in 1996 after a long battle with cancer. Shortly afterward, her youngest daughter's father commits suicide. On Valentine's Day, one of her closest friends is murdered on a Philly street. And on March 9th of that year, eight months of grief and loss culminate with the love of her life being killed in a drive-by shooting 3,000 miles from home.

"Charli Baltimore has lost her soul a hundred times," says Lance "Un" Rivera, the head of Untertainment Records. "She's given her heart and put all her time and energy into one thing, and then all of the sudden, it's been taken away. Charli's happiness was just out front. But behind all the smiles, if you look into her eyes you would see the sorrow, misery, and a life of shhh. If the outside appearance told the inside story, it would be something worth listening to."

Charli's tragedies have also strengthed her and kept her grounded. Her just-one-of-the-guys dispostion prompted members of The LOX to affectionately nickname her "Chuck." But she realizes that some of this has been lost on listeners to her recent efforts. "It's hurtful when you're trying really hard, and people is like, 'Get the f outta here,'" she says. "I'm not going to back off this rap shhh cuz people is still nonbelievers. If the fans don't know you, how they gonna feel you?" She pauses for a moment. "I'm gonna get some type of props off this album. I'll at least open people's eyes, like, 'Yo, Charli is nice!"

Charli grew up rhyming for fun, but never really considered a rap career until after she met Biggie. As a joke, she once rapped on his answering machine. But the message was so dope that Biggie began taking her seriously, urging Charli to write even more. Biggie even made plans to form a trio called the Commission, starring him, Charli, and Jay-Z.

Of course, when Charli met Biggie, the likelihood of them forming a group seemed about as remote as the possibility of a real romance between them. He was still married to Faith. Lil' Kim was always around somewhere. Charli, meanwhile, was raising her two daughters on her own. But in time, she and Biggie became inseparable. She accompanied him on tours. They traveled overseas. His crew crashed at her house in Philly. Love was love.

But soon after Biggie was killed, Charli became the estranged girlfriend no one knew. Worse, people began to accuse her of using his name to get on. "I had seen her at the funeral," recounts Rivera, a longtime friend og Biggie's. "I was sitting in the family car parked outside of the funeral, and Charli came walking up the street by herself, crying. It's kinda messed up because she was supposed to be in the car with us, but nobody was taking care of her. So I wanted at least to give her opportunity to take care of herself."

He did. Having been told by Biggie about a honey who could rap her ass off, Un invited Charli to New York a month lter to hear for himself. "When she came up, I seen what Biggie was talking about," he says. "She spitting real hard lyrics." He immediately signed her.

"They can say what they wanna say," Charli says softly in response to suggestions that she's leeching off Biggie's legacy. "But I know what me and Biggie had. He was my boo until he died. That's what he told me, and that's what I told him. So me exploiting Biggie or using him in any type of way has never been my intention, and will never be my intention. I'm always gonna be grateful and thankful to Biggie. But he wasn't her to write my album. He couldn't co-sign everything that's going down over here. But I think if he heard my album, he would be like, 'Yo, Ma, that's hot.'"

If Charli's recent strings of cameos are any indication, other MCs agree. In the past several months, Charli has worked with Noreaga, Cam'ron, Ghostface Killah, and a host of other hot stars. To, umm, top it all off, Charli even appeared naked from the waist up in a photo spread for a British music magazine - proving she could make heads both nod and turn.

On a recent trip to the Bronx Zoo, however, Charli isn't drawing any attention - and doesn't want to. As she and her four-year-old daughter, Siaanni, stroll along the walkways, Charli is focused on the sights. Dressed in a furry gray jacket and a fresh pair of royal blue New Balance sneakers, Charli stops to take in a 1,200-pound polar bear rocking back and forth atop a faux ice cap. Siaanni has been urging her to move on so they can see the "hiccototamuses."

Charli says one of the worst aspects of her new career is the time she has to spend away from her children - her elder daughter, India, is eight - due to studio sessions and show dates. "I just try to explain to my oldest daughter that this is for her," she says. "I really look at it from that perspective. I'm making sure that her future is straight. She knows mommy got to pay her tuition."

And so Charli keeps striving, keeps surviving. Forget the glitter of Cold AS Ice. Working mom, forgotten ex, bereaved daughter, tragedy survivor - these are what Charli rpresents. So what if the critics complain?