Monique Imes was never one to shun the spotlight. That was true back in the day, when she was just a little girl growing up in Baltimore County. And it's even more true today, now that she's become famous as Mo'Nique, BET talk-show host and Oscar-nominated actress.

"Oh yeah, I was maybe four, and I just liked to shake myself in front of everybody," Mo'Nique, 42, recalls with a laugh, just minutes before heading into an Atlanta television studio to tape an episode of her nightly talk show. "It was like, 'Look at my new dance.' I loved the attention, baby. I think I was a crowd pleaser when I first got here, but I can't remember."

Maybe she can't remember her earliest days in front of an audience, but her family can. They still chuckle at the memory of a four-year-old Monique getting up in front of them. It may have looked more like shaking than grooving, but young Monique was clearly loving the attention.

"She was a pretty little girl, she was a pretty baby," recalls her aunt, Betty Wilson. "She was always a little spicy...not much, but she knew what she wanted.

"She was always in the limelight," her aunt remembers. "She was just being Monique."

To her friends and family, "just being Monique" meant being quite the sparkplug. She loved attention, loved speaking her mind, loved making people laugh. Clearly, young Monique spent a lot of years in training before she became the Mo'Nique whose star turn in "Precious: Based On the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire" has won just about every acting award Hollywood has invented.

"She was always very funny," says her cousin, Robin Wardlaw, 41, a claims authorizer for the Social Security Administration. "We went to the playground together, we went skating together, we went to the mall together, we went to eat together. We did a little bit of everything. And we always had fun."

A Saint Agnes Hospital baby, Mo'Nique retains fond memories of the Woodlawn/Randallstown area. "I grew up on Fox Meadow Road, right off of Essex Road. It was a middle-class neighborhood, very diverse. It was a good place to grow up - we had a big backyard, the neighbors were really friendly.

"It was a fun time," she says. "It was when the 28 bus ran all the way up to Carriage Hill, and that way we were able to go to Druid Hill Park, because the bus would pick us up in front of the apartment and drop us off in front of the apartment. It was a time when you could go out and not be so fearful."

Michele Brooks (nee Bowens), Mo'Nique's best friend since the two of them started the first grade together, says fun was never in short supply when they were together. By the time they attended Milford Mill Academy, they were going to the old Painters Mill skating rinks together, hanging out at the Liberty and Security Square cinemas.

But young Mo'Nique, Brooks, 43, recalls with a laugh, seemed old beyond her years, seemed like a young girl with plans. She wore suits to school and carried a briefcase, which didn't always sit well with her classmates.

Often, Brooks says, it was left to her to stick up for her friend. Which she was always quick to do.

"All the time, she would run her mouth, and then she wouldn't fight. I was the fighter," says Brooks. "I've been her protector, even in adulthood. Honestly, it's never been for myself. It's always been to protect her.

"Her mouth was always...even up to this day, her mouth is always getting her into trouble. I was always the one that would back her up."

The pair was pretty-much inseparable during high school. "They were always together," says classmate Robert White. "They even get together still, whenever Mo'Nique's back in Baltimore."

Not surprisingly, they weren't above getting into a little trouble occasionally. Nothing serious, mind you, just the kind of stuff high-school kids always get in trouble about.

"I remember one time," Brooks says, "we were in typing class. I got in trouble, and she was looking at my paper.

"I got in trouble because they knew we were the best of friends, so they thought we were cheating together. I was like, 'Hey, she's looking at my paper." Here I'm trying to cover my paper, and she's laughing."

Still, their friendship is more than just past good times, Brooks says. Mo'Nique was the maid of honor at her wedding, and Brooks was maid of honor at Mo'Nique's - all three of them. And when Brooks' husband, Robert, died suddenly of a heart attack two years ago, Mo'Nique showed up at her friend's side - without having to be asked.

"I did not ask, I didn't even know she was coming," Brooks says. "But I knew she would show. She held my hand all the way."

Most of all, says her aunt, Mo'Nique remains Monique. In all the ways that are important, Betty Wilson says, her niece hasn't changed.

"I had her here at my house a few years ago for dinner," she says. "And as soon as she comes in the door, she kicked off her shoes and was just herself.

"She's just so down to earth. This has not gotten her head big. Mo'Nique is still the same. She would do anything in the world for you."