Real People: Why are they famous? Paula Hamilton

Main claim

Thanks to a brilliant performance 11 years ago as the abandoned lover in a Volkswagen ad - she threw away the ring and the fur coat but kept the Golf GTI - Paula Hamilton is still "the VW girl". She also appeared in the film Mad Dogs and Englishmen. As model/actress/celebrity she now pops up with remarkable regularity in gossip columns and with admirable enthusiasm on television game and chat shows. Since playing her latest role as the seducer of a monk, Paula has seen the light. "Coming back to my faith has helped me a lot," she explains of the Roman Catholic tradition. "It gives me great comfort. We all need to believe in something outside ourselves, to behave ourselves and be nice to each other."

Appearance

Eighties hairdresser's poster model. Selina Scott's fuller-faced young sister, Cable TV exercise instructor. Pouting lips, taut body and tumble of highlights look.

Best attempts to wreck herself with drink and drugs (see later) confounded by ability to appear next morning as unblemished English middle class rose.

It girl

Seen at camera-infested events of major and minor significance, usually playing the starlet in search of a publicity handle. Much loved by the popular press for her liability to do bad things - and her willingness to confess to them afterwards.

Wild child

Spent a dyslexic childhood in South Africa and Chalfont St Peter. Earning pounds 1,000 a day as a teenage model, enthusiastically engaged in It Girl activities until her much-discussed addiction to drugs and alcohol nearly destroyed her career. Four rehab centres came to the rescue. Married to a cameraman for three years, she

wrote a book about her travails.

Tusk, tusk

Confounded suggestions of brainlessness and bimbo activitiy by becoming involved in an elephant charity, but was forced to resign following a drunken episode in a London cab and a night in the cells. Who could hold it against her?

Fame prospects

Paula, 37, lives with a terrier called Titchy Piglet T-Pot in Brixton. Hello! knows the address.