Britain's most famous transsexual, April Ashley, tells all in her new autobiography. She spoke with Katrina Fox.

A Vogue model, national celebrity and the toast of London's swinging '60s, April Ashley led a glamorous jet-set lifestyle. She was pursued by several men, including Elvis Presley, and has had affairs with Omar Shariff, Peter O'Toole and a one-night stand with INXS frontman, Michael Hutchence.

But it wasn't all plain sailing for Ashley, christened George Jamieson in 1935, who grew up in a Liverpool slum. Convinced she was a girl in a boy's body and with no family or medical support for a condition that had not yet been named (transsexualism), Ashley attempted suicide before moving to Paris and finding work with a troupe of female impersonators, including Bambi and Coccinelle, at the legendary Le Carrousel club.

Ashley underwent what she still refers to today as her "sex change" operation in Casablanca in 1960 and married aristocrat Arthur Corbett three years later. Their divorce in 1970 made international headlines and led to a legal precedent that would have implications for all transsexual people in the UK for the next 35 years. The judge ruled that Ashley was not a woman, therefore the marriage was void. Ashley got nothing from the divorce settlement and transsexuals in the UK were unable to get married as their reassigned gender or change their birth certificates until 2004 when the Gender Recognition Act (GRA) was passed.
Ashley's autobiography, The First Lady, is a moving and often hilarious account of an extraordinary person's life. From references to Vanessa Redgrave as "that awful bore" to pictures of Amanda Lear as a boy (Alain Tapp) - despite the disco star having denied to this day that she is transsexual - and endless celebrity name-dropping, it's a riveting read. The opinionated, eccentric and well-spoken septuagenarian is also a delight to talk to. Age has bestowed a frankness on 71-year-old Ashley that she positively revels in, discarding political correctness as if it were a piece of used toilet paper.

Take the melee of new labels used by people to describe their sex and gender fluidity nowadays, for instance. "Quite frankly, I don't understand all these new identities," she says. "Like 'transgender'. I never use it; when I talk about it I say I had a sex change and I'm not going to change that because that's the way it was. I explain to people the difference between homosexuality, transsexuality and transvestism and keep it as simple as possible. I don't go into all these new fangled words - some of them I can't even pronounce and I just get tongue-tied. It's mind-boggling nowadays, and also there's all this being politically correct. Every day I read in the newspaper another thing that has to go and it's infuriating; it drives you mad."

Then there are the lesbians. "I lived in the lesbian capital of the world, which is San Diego, you know," she declares. "It's a military town and two of my very best friends are lesbians in San Diego. I went to a lesbian club once or twice with them - I must say I didn't go too often, except on Sundays, as they were rather ugly lesbians, but on Sundays they looked like movie stars because they were all wearing their uniforms when they were not supposed to. To have them enquiring about you would be extraordinary. My friend would say to me, 'See that lovely girl over there? She wants to know who you are and are you free?' And I would just say, 'Darling, I didn't go through what I went through to become a lesbian, thank you very much indeed'. It was funny."

While transsexuals were not always welcome in gay clubs in the past (rumour has it that Jerry Hall was denied entry to certain London clubs because people thought she was transsexual), when asked how she's been treated by the gay community, Ashley cries, "Like an empress!" Just for good measure, she repeats it: "Like an empress! I couldn't criticise them in any way whatsoever. Indeed I got many, many emails from gay men saying, 'Thank you, your story helped me and gave me the courage to come out to my friends and parents,' so that was rather nice."

Despite some health problems involving her knees in 2003 (she still has "very good legs, having won the Most Beautiful Legs competition in the south of France 50 years ago" by the way), Ashley is now itching to move back to the US and return to the business of selling art. "I did five years for Greenpeace, you know - I'm a rainbow warrior and in their Hall of Fame," she announces proudly. "But my real job is selling art and talking about it - if you get the right customer it can be very stimulating."

Australia is also on her wish list of places to revisit. "I adore Sydney!" she proclaims. "If someone invites me, I'd be there in a shot. After going to bed with Michael Hutchence [in the mid-1980s], I fell in love with Sydney; it's so beautiful. It's a wonderful country and the people are marvellous." And so is April Ashley.

The First Lady by April Ashley with Douglas Thomson is published by John Blake.

SX News is one of Australia's leading gay and lesbian arts, entertainment, news and culture magazines For more information visit the magazine's website at www.sxnews.com.au