Taylor Swift: Little Miss Perfect

When she was 11, Taylor persuaded her mom to vacation in Nashville, the country-music mecca. “I had a demo CD of me singing karaoke music. We rented a car, and we would pull up in front of a label on Music Row and I’d walk in and talk to the receptionist: ‘Hi, I’m Taylor. I’m 11. I really want a record deal.’”

The receptionists didn’t sign her, but the trip whetted Taylor’s appetite. She began lobbying to relocate to Nashville.

Most parents would view this as a child’s whim, an unrealistic passing ­fancy—­country stars aren’t born to Pennsylvania stockbrokers. Then her lobbying turned to begging and cajoling, and finally, in 2004, the family loaded up the truck and moved to Tennessee, like the Beverly Hillbillies in reverse. “My father had a job he could do from anywhere,” Swift says. “My parents moved across the country so I could pursue a dream.”

The rest is already the stuff of Nashville legend. At age 13, Taylor inked a development deal with RCA. The following year, she signed a songwriting contract with Sony/ATV Music Publishing, becoming perhaps the youngest professional tunesmith in Nashville history. In the mornings, Swift would trundle off to Hendersonville High, where she got straight A’s; in the afternoons, her mother would ferry her, soccer-mom style, to Music Row for her songwriting sessions. Swift teamed up with veteran songwriter Liz Rose, and the pair began churning out material. “My sessions with Taylor were some of the easiest I’ve ever done,” Rose says. “Basically, I was just her editor. She’d write about what happened to her in school that day. She had such a clear vision of what she was trying to say. And she’d come in with some of the most incredible hooks.”

RCA wasn’t so sure. A brief vogue for teen country singers—including Lila McCann, who sang adult love songs even though she wore braces—had peaked, which was probably inevitable in a genre that appeals primarily to women aged 24 to 35. Also, there hadn’t been a new female country star in years: Shania Twain had hidden herself away in a European castle, eating macrobiotic, while Reba McEntire ditched music for a network-TV series. Big Machine founder Scott Borchetta—a relentless, willful executive who’d been fired from Universal despite being the best promotion man in town—pounced after seeing Swift play a few numbers at a songwriter night. “He broke two rules,” says a Nashville executive. “Taylor was a teenager and she was female.”

One afternoon in 2005, Swift brought in a new ballad to play for Rose. The song—a gentle farewell to ex-boyfriend Drew—had a wistful, indelible melody. Even better, it had a surefire gimmick, name-checking one of the biggest country stars on Earth: “When you think Tim McGraw/I hope you think my favorite song/The one we danced to all night long.” There was no question what Swift’s lead single would be. In July 2006, “Tim McGraw” cracked the country Top 10. By the time she finally met her song’s namesake, on May 15, 2007—on live television, following a solo acoustic performance of the hit at the Academy of Country Music Awards—she could greet him as a fellow platinum-selling superstar.

Today, Swift lives with her mom, dad and 16-year-old brother, Austin, in the same rambling McMansion they moved into when they arrived from Pennsylvania. One of her parents always travels with her on tour. Taylor legally became an adult last December, but she is in no hurry to leave the nest. “My parents are the coolest,” she exults. “My mother is so not a momager.”

A visitor to the Swifts’ home would meet a group just like any other affluent suburban family, only far happier and more well-adjusted. There’s a music room, stocked with guitars, recording equipment and framed gold records and awards. But the house has not been turned into the Taylor Swift Hall of Fame and Museum, which may go a long way in explaining Swift’s diva-free affect. The only fancy toy she’s bought with her small fortune is the Lexus.

She recently went to a Nashville Predators hockey game with American Idol alums Carrie Underwood and Kellie Pickler. “It was really neat,” Pickler hoots. “Total blonde power. After the game, we pulled into a gas station and Carrie saw this guy talking to Taylor. We were like, This isn’t right! I said, ‘Get away from her, you old man. If you’re still around when we finish filling up with gas, we’ll make a hood ornament out of you!’”

Nights like that are rare: Swift prefers to spend what little free time she has with family or hanging out with her best friend, Abigail, a senior at Hendersonville High. Taylor is polite and articulate and funny and self-­deprecating—the only time she bristles is when she is reminded that she has occasionally been called “the country Britney Spears.” And who can blame her?