A few weeks ago, an extraordinary photo shoot took place - featuring one of Britain's best-loved celebrities showing off her stunning new look.

Trisha Goddard, chat-show queen, had chosen a dramatically different hairstyle, a closely cropped bob bleached a shocking blonde.

But this was no ordinary haircut, and certainly no run-of-the-mill photoshoot. Because as Trisha posed for the pictures showing her startlingly different image for the first time, the atmosphere was emotionally charged.

This was Trisha taking her first step in public as she prepared for chemotherapy in her battle against cancer.

As the Mail revealed yesterday, the resulting photographs have now appeared in this week's Hello! - and messages of support and affection have flooded in.

The magazine's news editor Thomas Whitaker said: 'It has simply been one of the biggest responses to a photo shoot we have seen in recent years.'

Meanwhile, Trisha remains quietly at home, preparing for the chemotherapy which will now follow two operations for breast cancer.

It's an courageous statement of intent from a woman who has battled mental illness, infidelity, the loss of a beloved sister to suicide and scars from a traumatic childhood.

But with typical defiance, when I spoke to her this week, she said: 'This is my way of sticking two fingers up at the situation I find myself in.

'It would be bull***t to say that I feel liberated and wonderful with this new hairstyle, because it reminds me of what is to come with my chemotherapy and it scares me.

'But on the other hand, I'm pleased I've made this statement through the hairstyle. I've seized back just a tiny bit of control in a situation, which is otherwise out of my control.'

Life for Trisha, the 50-year-old star of daytime television, was wrenched apart in February this year after a routine mammogram which she slotted into her hectic schedule without a second thought.

'I had the mammogram and just thought "Fine", and forgot all about it. The next week they called me in, and I thought they would just go back through the results.

'Instead, the doctor said they had found a hard area. I asked the doctor directly what he thought it was, and he said: "Look, I do think it is cancer."

Old style Trisha with her long brown curls

'I was a bit overwhelmed. I came home and told my husband Peter, but not my daughters. The hospital had both of us back and went through everything and said: "Maybe it's this, maybe it's that." But deep down, I just knew.'

Trisha's husband Peter Gianfrancesco was by her side the following Monday, when they were told she had breast cancer.

She says: 'We went to see the doctor, and he said: "Now, about the operation." I said: "When will that be?" and he replied: "Tomorrow."'

That night, the couple sat down and told Trisha's two children from a previous marriage, Billie, 18, and Madi, 14.

Trisha says: 'My eldest daughter was very tearful. But my husband and I knew how they'd react. Billie is far more emotional, like I used to be when I was younger. Madi is very pragmatic, and fired questions at us.

'I asked the girls just to be the same girls they've always been - just to treat me the same, because if you start being treated like a sick person, you start seeing yourself as a victim.

'A few days earlier, I had taken Billie to see a university. It was close to where I used to live, and my mum used to work at the university, so I took her for a tour and said: "This is my old house, this is my old school."

I was teary about the reminiscing and she didn't know why, but we had the best trip and I lost myself in her joy and excitement. For that day, I could forget about it.

'When Billie heard about the cancer, she said: "How could you have been like that the whole day?" but I said: "It was your day, and I didn't want you feeling that you can't leave home because Mummy's ill. I also wanted you to know I'm the same Mummy, now that I'm ill, that I was before."'

Trisha pauses and adds: 'We had a ball that day, and she'll always remember the day as fun.'

The morning after telling her daughters, Trisha was admitted for a lumpectomy - removal of the tumour - and a sentinel node biopsy, where several lymph nodes are removed to see if the cancer has spread.

When I came round from the operation, Peter was there with me. I only stayed in for one night. The next day, when we got home, I just had to go out for a walk.

'I just stood there in the sleet, and Peter told me: "You're a mad woman," but he walked alongside me, saying: "Slow down, slow down."'

The couple were hopeful that the cancer had been caught at an early stage and had not yet spread. But on April 6 they were told that a microcell of cancer had been found in one of the lymph nodes they examined.

It meant that Trisha would have to return two days later to have the rest of the lymph nodes on that side removed.

Support: Trisha with husband Peter and daughters Madi and Billie on her wedding day

It was, she admits, devastating news. She says with typical bluntness: 'It was a s**t day. The doctor said: "Sorry we've got to take all these lymph nodes out." I needed a few moments to compose myself.'

In these, her bleakest moments, did she ever sit down with her husband and discuss death?

She says slowly: 'It was never a conversation we had, but a couple of times I did go a bit haywire. You can read too much sometimes, or sometimes people try to be kind and say: "Don't worry, my mother went through that and she had a lovely three years before she died . . ."

'I'd get a bit panicky. Peter always came with me to the doctors, and he'd ask questions as I'd sit there processing it.

'Mind racing, I'd wake Peter up at three in the morning and be in a state, and he'd cuddle me.

'I can't express how amazing Peter has been. He's strong, but he cries. He's made me laugh, he's made me do laps of the ward to get my legs going. He's cuddled up in bed with me, and told me it's OK.'

She says: 'When the lymph nodes were removed second time around, it was far more painful and I had a drain in, so it was hard. The nurse would come in and say: "Is there anything you want?" And I'd say: "Yes, Brad Pitt and my running shoes." But I was going stir crazy.

'The girls were great when they came to see me. Billie was saying: "Oh my goodness, I had to do the shopping. Madi eats this cereal, Dad eats that cereal, and the dog eats this. I had to go to the fish counter and the man cut the head off the fish. People must think I'm a single mum."

'She had me laughing. Everyone has been doing things that they don't normally do. We haven't had to engineer or manufacture special time with the girls - it's just happened.

'The special part was when they came to the hospital and just talked. We're a talkie family, we always have been. It did me good to hear them going on about their lives, teachers and school.'

Trisha adds: 'One part of me thinks "Why me?" but on the other hand, why wouldn't it be me? When I had a breakdown, they said that one in four people suffer from mental health problems. So why shouldn't I be one of those people who get cancer?

Trisha with husband Peter Gianfrancesco after a premier party in 2000. He was by her side the day she discovered she has breast cancer

'I started the contraceptive pill very early, and the dosage of those early pills was very high. I started my period early, and I had children late. Family genetics only play a small part in cancer.

'I do have faith, and I don't know why this is happening now. But I'm lucky - I have a family who love me. I'm not some poor woman stuck on her own in a housing estate with no family and no one around.'

Among the thousands of messages of support has been a note from Prime Minister Gordon Brown and wife Sarah - who Trisha met at an official lunch in March, just days after her lumpectomy.

She says: 'I was wearing a dress that caused me the least pain, and black biker boots because I didn't know if I'd topple over. No one knew about the cancer, and no one guessed. I met Carla Bruni and Annie Lennox, one of my all-time heroines.

'I began to feel very wobbly and very panicky during the luncheon, and I felt "I have to confide in someone."

'Fiona Phillips from GMTV was there, and I told her what had happened and said: "Please can you look after me." Telling anyone is horrific, but I just had to trust Fiona.

'She was fantastic, she looked after me very surreptitiously. I know she didn't tell a soul, but she kept looking across the room, coming to my side and just touching my elbow to say "I'm there".'

Support has also come from a sympathetic public. Trisha says: 'I haven't been out a lot. The other day, I went to my local Tesco Express, and got too much shopping. I felt a bit woozy, and said: "I'll have to come back and collect my bags."

'I doddered outside to have a breather, and the next thing there were these two builders behind me with my shopping.

'They said: "Are you that Trisha? Take it easy love, you shouldn't be doing this." They were so sweet, putting my stuff into the car, telling me to take it easy, that it made me feel really teary.'

Trisha's younger daughter Madi has also developed an instinctive protectiveness of her mother.

Trisha says: 'She noticed that I was starting to feel really panicky in crowds. I hadn't told Madi, and she was out with Peter and me when I said "Mummy feels a bit wobbly."
'She said "Well Mamma, I'll put my arm around you and everyone will think this is a mamma and daughter cuddle. They won't realise you feel like falling down."'

Trisha pauses, and adds: 'That brought real tears to my eyes. Like when Billie does the cooking. I don't care if they moan about the fact that everyone wants to eat different food. I have a family that loves me.

'When I first told the girls, I said "Look at Kylie - she's all right. She hasn't had children, she's not in a loving marriage, but Kylie has got through it."'

Trisha had only just completed the harrowing and extraordinary book of her life - serialised in the Daily Mail - when she was diagnosed.

She says wryly: 'Trust me, this isn't a plug for the book. I didn't say: "Oh, I'll go and get cancer."

'I asked my husband to take the photo of me for the cover of the book, and now I look at it and it's weird because I already had cancer and I did not know it.'

Her cancer diagnosis is just the latest chapter of a life which includes two failed marriages, a husband who was secretly gay and who later died of Aids, and the near-death of her infant daughter.

She says: 'I've often said that if I wasn't me, I just wouldn't believe all these things have happened to me. And now this.'

But perhaps the true spirit of this remarkable woman is summed up by her decision to prepare for chemotherapy sessions by having her new bob radically cropped and bleached - and then to pose confident and smiling for a glossy magazine photo spread.

'I had to consider the prospect of losing my hair,' Trisha says, 'something which really scared me. After all, as a woman, my hair helps me feel feminine. Also, if my hair does end up falling out, I don't want to look like a victim.'

Despite her plans, the transformation came as a shock.

She says: 'If I look in the mirror, it is like an intruder staring back - a stranger that I don't recognise.'

Yet she remains philosophical. 'It sounds corny but it is spring and everything is so pretty here in Norfolk. I've been out seeing things like little bunny rabbits and bluebells, birds' nests, trees, leaves and swans.

'Even if it is raining, I've enjoyed feeling the drops on my face.'

• As I Am by Trisha Goddard is published by John Blake Publishing, priced £17.99.