Mel B has opened up about her fellow Spice Girls' emotional reaction to boyfriend Rory McPhee 's proposal, revealing that they broke down in tears over the news.
The Spice Girl, 47, will marry for the third time after the hairdresser, 34, got down on one knee at the luxury five-star country house Cliveden Hotel in Berkshire.
And now the soon-to-be husband-and-wife has done their first joint interview together since announcing the happy news.
Mel, who is best known as Scary Spice, has revealed that her Spice Girls bandmates gave Rory the seal of approval from very early on and were even pushing her towards him before the two became romantically involved.
As friends first, Melanie said she told the Girls: “It's not like that; he's just a really good friend who makes me feel safe."
She told how Emma Bunton and Mel C cried tears of joy when she told them she was engaged.
Mel told Hello magazine: "All of them were delighted for us and said, 'We love Rory, he's amazing' and they've all sent congratulations cards. I do care about their opinion and it's really special to me that they like Rory so much, because they've never liked any of my boyfriends and they've been quite clear about that.”
Rory got down on one knee with a £100,000 champagne-coloured diamond ring when they stayed in the hotel last week.
"For the first time in my life, I'm engaged to a beautiful, honest person who makes me feel protected, nurtured and so loved, and I want to savour that," Mel shared.
Rory opened up about popping the question, telling how he took Melanie for a walk around the grounds of the fancy hotel with their dogs before they had dinner.
He said he was so nervous that his lips were trembling. Rory had spent ages writing his proposal speech but ended up “babbling”.
Mel said: “On the way back, Rory suddenly said, 'I'm going to go back to the room and put the fire on'. I didn't think anything of it, but I did get this funny feeling in my stomach. Then, as I walked through the door, he got down on one knee."
"It was lovely, what you said," Melanie said. "He told me he loved me, that I was his best friend and that he wanted to be with me for the rest of our lives."
Mel has been married twice before. First to dancer Jimmy Gulzar, who she shares eldest daughter Phoenix Chi, now 23, with.
Her second marriage was to US TV producer Stephen Belafonte, which lasted 10 years and Mel claims was physically and emotionally abusive. They have an 11-year-old daughter called Madison together.
She also has 15-year-old daughter Angel with actor Eddie Murphy.
Finding love hasn’t always been easy for Mel, who has spoken out about her abusive 10-year marriage to US TV producer Stephen Belafonte.
Stephen has always denied the allegations and the couple divorced in 2017.
Speaking earlier this year, she said she was in an “emotionally and physically abusive marriage” for a decade, which was so bad she can barely remember what happened to her because of post-abuse trauma, which can “last a lifetime”.
“Nearly five years on I still wake up in the early hours with terrifying fragments of sounds and images flitting into my brain,” Mel said, admitting that some nights she wakes up “drenched in shame, sweat and fear”.
Mel became a patron for domestic violence survivors' charity, Women's Aid, in November 2018 and was later awarded an MBE for her work helping other women suffering domestic abuse.
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