‘What’s it to be then - Kinky Watermelon or Electric Moonfruit?’

‘Got to be the Moonfruit,’ I insist, refraining from the predictable temptation to pun about how kinky I could get with a watermelon. I save such cheap-jack innuendoes for when I’m on stage. ‘I’m in a cerise mood today, darling.'

'Right you are.'

'Why do eyeshadow colours have such pretentious names anyway?’ I ask of Jasmine, who has the task today of glamourpussing-up my crows feet-trodden skin.

As the girl obligingly smears my lids with surreally monikered shadow, her new assistant beautician, Kerry, totters in with a silver tray bearing champagne, two crystal flutes and my special cigarette holder. The black one, spangled with diamanté flecks.

‘Aw, you shouldn’t have!’ It’s a cliché, and borne out of my twin reactions, both influenced by my Black Country upbringing: embarrassment - this sort of thing isn’t exactly de rigueur in Dudley - and self-indulgent glee. I mean, these Shirley Bassey moments are precisely what I aspired to during my working-class-made-good, single-parent, all-it-needed-was-a-whippet-to-make-the-stereotype-complete childhood.

‘Well it’s not every day we get a glamorous superstar in,’ Kerry quakes, clearly overawed - bless her!

‘Oh, I’m hardly that,’ I giggle, wafting a ciggie. I know smoking’s naughty, but I confess I enjoy the sensation of a tapering - OK, phallic - cigarette holder between my fingers; the prop of a diva.

‘Oi, our Mel: chuck us one o’ them fags, would you, love,’ comes a lipstick-brush-muffled rasp next to me, ‘and a glass o’ that bubbly. And I think you ought to try that peachier blusher this time. Meks you look less, well…tarty!’

‘You could be right, Mom,’ I concede, contemplating the rainbow of hues in Jasmine’s palette. She usually is.

Grinning, I hand her a flute and we chink. ‘Cheers! Get that down yer Gregory!’

Trust dear Mom to tug me back down to earth.

This is another boon about fame and affluence: the capacity they afford me to treat her - in attempted recompense for a lifetime’s unflagging love and influence.

We’ve been a tight unit since Dad’s passing in 1964, when I was a vulnerable kid of nine. I’m not sure I’ve always been the easiest of offspring, though. While Mom was out slaving for a wage at the Teddy Gray’s sweet factory in Dudley, I’d be sneaking in her room, swathing my adolescent form in her dresses, splodging her poor lipsticks across my mouth, posturing in the mirror and dreaming of glitzy diva-dom.

Years later, it was Mom who actually coined my stage name Melba Most; she who - despite being dead-beat from her Teddy Gray’s shift - would stop up all night sewing sequins on my costumes for those tatty cabaret ‘nites’ at the Ferret & Greyhound; she who was on the front row the night I won The Big Big Talent Show; she who’s held my hand (well not literally) through numerous Royal Varieties and Parkinson interviews.

Hence I adore bringing her here, for facials and Jacuzzis at my favourite retreat - Swinley Grange, one of the UK’s most exclusive health spas. This converted stately home is set in six bucolic acres, handily local to the South Staffordshire village where I’ve made my home and where I bought Mom a neighbouring apartment five years ago.

Her abode is in fact smaller than Swinley Grange’s sublime Royal Suite, which comprises our accommodation this weekend. These opulent quarters consist of a lounge with a settee, a dining table and a TV the size of Brierley Hill, two colossal four-postered bedrooms, two bathrooms, three balconies, and even a private sauna - all radiating off one another in a continuous crescent. It costs £400 a night, and past occupants include Fergie (that’s Duchess of York Fergie, not the Black Eyed Peas vocalist), Matt Lucas, and Deirdre out of Corrie.

All super-indulgent, I know - Mom did her fruit the first time I unlocked the Royal Suite front door and ushered her up our private, penthouse-style staircase.

‘Ooh, our Mel, what the hell d’you wanna go a-splurgin’ yer cash like this for? A normal room woulda done.’ And she really flipped in her bathroom - well she'd never seen a bidet before! Yow can tek the wench out of Dudley…and all that.

But it’s like I said: I went without for so many years - and now I fully intend to relish going with.

There’s another reason for my current presence here, actually: I’m performing tonight, in the Oasis Room. Thus the slap is being troweled on a little thicker than usual. I do a fair bit of stand-up - in fact I thrive on the whole edgy vibe of it - and like to support the Swinley Grange lot when I can.

‘What’ve you been doing today then, Mrs Corns?’ Kerry is enquiring of my mother as she buffs her cheeks with Clarins blusher. Mom’s a Superdrug girl normally, so it’s good to see her scrub up poshly occasionally.

‘Ooh, well me and Mel had a sauna before breakfast - go our own, y’know, bostin’ it is - then later we did a bit o’ swimming, went in the Jacuzzi’ - she pronounces it "Jacutzee" - ‘and after, we did a tai chi class - all them funny ’and movements - then we got our legs waxed - ooh, I woe too sure about that - stung like ’ell, it did, and I ai’ got as much leg hair as our Mel…’

‘Who’ve you had in lately?’ I’m meanwhile enquiring of Jasmine, as she crusts up my lashes with Clarins Pure Curl. 'Anyone of note?'

They’re not unaccustomed to celebs here, you see - folks leave you alone; you’re spared the paranoia that fixated fans will sneak gross snaps of you in the steam room.

'Last week,' Kerry chimes in, all wobbly and starstruck, 'we had that big chap in - ooh, y'know, him off That Peter Kay Thing - '

'Peter Kay.'

'That's the one!'

‘Jordan and Peter Andre were here a couple of months back,’ offers Jasmine. She’s more blasé. The mascara wand remains mega-steady in her hand.

'Really?' Kerry goes squealy again.

'Yeah, it was just before you started, Kez.'

‘We went to the wedding,’ I name-dropped, ‘Mom and I. Never met the couple before - nor had quite a few of the guests, to be honest, but we’re both big fans of Peter.’

‘He looked dead cute in the OK piccies.’

‘Delicious, my dear, delicious! The cake was nice and all.’

‘You ought to see if that Jordan’s selling her wedding frock now,’ Mom suggests, ‘it’d look good on you in one of your shows, our Mel!’

I can’t talk much then - or so much as pull a 'You have to be kidding' grimace - as Jasmine is daubing my lips with Immoral Coral, while Mom is having Lippy Chick glooped across hers.

‘All finished!’ Mom beams in her chair, and looks so transformed and fab and glamorous that I swell with extraordinary pride.

‘I’m nearly there.’ And then Jasmine slots a raven-tressy wig on to my bonce and I am actually there. ‘Ready!’ And it’s Mom’s turn to be proud.

‘Our Melvyn's always loved dressing up, ain't yer, son?’

‘Ready for your audience then?’ Kerry breathes. ‘One last thing, though - don't s'pose there's any chance of an autograph?’

‘For you, darling, anything,’ I accede, squiggling my felt-tipped name across the shiny poster which proclaims: ‘SWINLEY GRANGE PRESENTS ITS HOT HEN NIGHT CABARET - STARRING THE UK'S TOP DRAG QUEEN MELBA MOST AND THE ITALIAN STALLIONS!!!’

Yeah, I think as I ease myself regally out of the beauty salon chair, letting my scarlet skirts fan out into a train behind me, life didn’t always glitter so for little Melvyn Corns from Dudley. He hasn’t half come a long way.