Australian pop guru recalls a mixed-up Michael (Extra)

Jun 26, 2009, 2:38 GMT

   Sydney - A prodigious talent that rose above a hellish home life to meet the greatest of expectations, was how Australian pop music guru and friend Molly Meldrum summed up Michael Jackson.

   'He was just a craftsman and such an amazing performer on stage,' said Meldrum, who interviewed the King of Pop both when he was with the Jackson 5 and during his solo career.

   'By the time he was 9 years old he was like a superstar in the world and basically was flown into that arena and, in my mind, never came out of that arena,' Meldrum said.

   Jackson's seeming reluctance to accept that he was black was a product of his secluded, hot-house home life, he said.

   '(Jackson's brother) Jermaine would often tell me that for Michael it was really hard where the rest of the boys ... were able to go out and play with their friends .. while Joe, their father, always insisted that Michael would have to keep rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing,' Meldrum said.

   'So, he spent a lot of his life almost in the house itself and when he wasn't rehearsing he was watching shows like The Partridge Family, My Three Sons, Leave It To Beaver, whatever, where there were no Afro-American actors in any of those sitcoms. And he started to think that the only way he would make it in the world was to be white, you know, which was horrendous.'