Zoe Salmon from Blue Peter is sporting a red dress slashed down to her bellybutton and pumping her pelvis as she performs Love Machine on peak-time television, then wonders why she's been slammed as too sexy for a kids' TV presenter.

That was the opening appearance by the 27-year old from Bangor, Co Down, on this year's Comic Relief Does Fame Academy on BBC1. Fellow Northern Irish contestant Colin Murray could hardly take his eyes off Zoe's exposed cleavage, and Northern Irish co-host Patrick Kielty made a string of jokes about it.

Yet just over a year ago, a devastating article in The Guardian criticised Zoe's provocative dress sense as inappropriate for a children's telly host, and called her everything from 'fatuous' to 'a full-size Barbie Doll' and a 'sexual bimbo'.

"I was really, really upset by that article - I cried for hours," Zoe reveals. " You'd need to be a very hardened person not to get upset when you read something that awful about yourself. But what I tried to remember in the middle of my tears is that the journalist didn't know me - she had never even met me. Maybe she just wanted a bit of publicity.

"And, at the end of the day, that's just one person's opinion. I'm not going to change my presenting style or dress sense to please someone like that. I don't think it's really about what I wear anyway; I think it's just because it's me. It's like this dress - it's not THAT revealing and I've seen Cat Deeley wearing similar things, but she doesn't come under the attacks I do."

Controversial

Zoe's last comments may seem rather pompous considering she only joined the Blue Peter team in December 2004, and her only other claim to fame was winning the Miss Northern Ireland beauty pageant in 1999. Yet, in the extraordinary tradition of the programme's presenters becoming embroiled in scandals - Peter Duncan appearing naked in a raunchy film, Janet Ellis conceiving a child out of wedlock, Richard Bacon caught snorting cocaine, to name but a few - Zoe is their current queen of controversy.

It all kicked off on the very day (October 26, 2004) it was announced in the Press that she was to be the long-running show's 30th presenter. Accompanying almost every article were photos of Zoe in her underwear.

"I've not spoken to that photographer since - he's in my black books," she confides. "Even though I was an established model in Northern Ireland then, I posed for him free of charge as a favour to build up his portfolio, because he was a friend of mine. Then, as soon as I got the job on Blue Peter, he sold all those photos which we agreed were private and would never be published, and they were in all the papers. That was below the belt."

Zoe insists there are no shots of a more graphic nature yet to emerge. And, despite famously performing Madonna's Material Girl in a bikini for the 2005 Blue Peter panto, she also says a lads' mag photo-shoot is out of the question.

"As far as I know, I haven't been approached. But, if I was, they'd probably contact BBC Publicity who wouldn't pass such a request on - they'd just go 'No, she's not doing that!' I probably wouldn't want to do it anyway. I'd much rather be on the front cover of Vogue than have a two or three page spread in a lads' mag. I've never gone down the glamour model/Page 3 route, and I certainly wouldn't want to now I'm a presenter."

Zoe had been a Blue Peter presenter a few weeks when she committed what's regarded as her biggest boob to date. She chose the Red Hand of Ulster, a symbol regularly used by loyalists and paramilitaries, as a logo to be used by British Airways to decorate a Boeing 757. The BBC said only four people complained - most notably Professor David Miller from Strathclyde University, who raised the issue in the media - but it caused such a furore that an apology was issued.

A still steaming Zoe declares: " The thing to remember about that whole saga is that one person started it, and he's Scottish. It would have hurt me if it had been someone from Northern Ireland, but it wasn't. He doesn't understand the history of the Red Hand, and there was ignorance among people in the Press who didn't understand it either. I support the Ulster rugby club who have the Red Hand on their shirts. The symbol of the Northern Ireland Fire Brigade is the Red Hand. Even the emblem of the Bangor Spectator newspaper is the Red Hand. There's no shame in being proud of the Red Hand. That was just one of those things where the Press grab on to something; they made a bigger deal of it than it was.

"It's upsetting for anyone to read in the papers that they think you're being a bigot or whatever. But the Northern Irish public, who've supported me since I was 19 and are my biggest fans, were all behind me. All I got were letters from people basically saying 'Zoe, don't worry we love you', and all I cared about was that I had my country supporting me" maintains Zoe. "But then they knew what the true history of the Red Hand was."

But things got worse when, not long later, she showed a picture of the Union Flag covering the whole of Ireland - a particularly sore point for the Republic which is not part of the United Kingdom and has its own flag.

"I didn't draw that map of Ireland," she explains. "Some six or seven-year old drew that and coloured it in wrong. I was just given that competition entry by the production team to hold up; I didn't choose it. I just think it was unfortunate, but the response was upsetting."

Dream job

Did those situations make Zoe more aware of her actions after that? " Well, hopefully it's made the Press more aware to be less ignorant." Was there any question of her resigning? "Definitely not!

" No, because I think that's what people want. They'd love you to throw the towel in. They'd love to know they'd got the better of you. This is my absolute dream job, and I would never give it up for anything or anyone, or pander to what they want me to do. I just turn a blind eye to it and get on with it."

Zoe’s eyes are green, yet in 2005 the fascist group Combat 18 declared her its ‘blue-eyed blonde-haired Aryan pin-up’.  “I was a bit shocked.  No-one wants adverse publicity, but what can you do?”

The numerous controversies surrounding Miss Salmon are bewildering in that you honestly couldn't meet a more delightful, straightforward, happy-go-lucky gal. Moreover, she swears she doesn't swear, smoke, get smashed or stoned. And she takes public transport rather than drives, to help the environment.

"It is a bit odd," agrees Zoe. " Controversy does seem to follow me about. It may simply be because Blue Peter is an institution - we're coming up to our 50th anniversary - and some people seem to want to attack something that's long-running and well-established.

"I certainly don't know why me. There's a million other girls out there with long blonde hair," argues Zoe, yet she admits that was precisely why she was picked on at school.

" I wouldn't call it blatant bullying but, from when I was 16, I had even longer hair than I do now, and a couple of girls in school (Glenlola Collegiate in Bangor) used to make jibes like, 'Look at your hair?why would you never get it cut? You should get it cut!' One day I did, to my shoulders, then one of those girls went out and bought a long hairpiece and started wearing that. What's more, I hear she's now changed careers to be a lawyer."

Zoe mentions this because she herself studied law for five years and qualified as a solicitor on September 1, 2004. The firm she worked her apprenticeship with, which is one of the biggest defence litigation firms in Northern Ireland, offered her a job. But so did Blue Peter that September 27.

"I loved being a lawyer, but finding my dream job on Blue Peter was like coming home. When we go live at 5pm on BBC1, I get an extra feeling I never got when I did law. But my knowledge of law does come in handy when I get given documents - I always read them before signing them."

She also says Blue Peter knew what they were doing when they signed her. And they have no rulebook which she and the other presenters - Konnie Huq, Gethin Jones and Andy Akinwolere - are forced to follow away from work.

"There are no guidelines. It really comes down to them choosing the right people for the Blue Peter job. When they chose me, they knew I had no skeletons in my closet, I was quite a good girl, and I hadn't done anything really bad in my life. I'm not saying I'm perfect by any stretch of the imagination, because I'm not; I just haven't done anything really naughty. Like most girls my age, I do like to go out dancing and clubbing with my friends" adds Zoe, adamant that the only red nose you'll see on her will be a Comic Relief one. "With Blue Peter you don't get much free time, so I only go out once or twice a month, and I don't go out to get drunk; I go out to be with my friends. I'm more interested in talking and I talk non-stop ... without even a sip of wine!"


Drift apart


Zoe ain't kidding either. She frequently rattles on and on like a runaway train. One thing she doesn't say much about is her love life, though she'd argue that's because she hasn't had one to speak of since splitting from Belfast web-design company boss, Jamie Robinson, in April 2005.

"It was a shame because we'd been going out for a couple of years. Distance became an issue. People just drift apart. I've had the odd dinner date with other guys since, but I haven't had another boyfriend.

"Ever since I was 19 and became a familiar face in Northern Ireland, I've always had the issue of whether guys want to go out with me just because I'm in the public eye. Then I did date a guy who I strongly believe did just go out with me because he wanted to climb some sort of social ladder. So I've had the heartbreak of knowing someone was going out with me for what I am and not who I really am, and I certainly wouldn't want to go through anything like that again.

"But Jamie is now one of my best friends, we're on the phone all the time, and he's one of the first people I see when I go home to Northern Ireland."

Home for Zoe almost since arriving in London has been a large two-bedroom Victorian flat in Wimbledon, which she shares with a Northern Irish friend, also named Zoe, and a lawyer. However, eager to live by herself now, Zoe will soon be selling the property - which has been valued at £560,000 - and buying a new place in Chiswick, because of its closeness to BBC TV centre.

She doesn't rule out returning to live near her family in Bangor one day. " With Blue Peter, I've travelled the world - in two years, I've been to 14 different countries. Yet, to me, there really is no place like home. Whenever I'm back in Bangor, I don't want to leave. But I do love London and I hope to stay for a while yet."

How long will Zoe stay with Blue Peter though? "It's so hard to say. As long as the viewers really like me and as long as I'm doing a good job, hopefully they'll want me to stay" she replies, presumably preferring to be remembered for her Red Nose contribution than her Red Hand controversy.

"Oh, I try not to take any of that personally. At the end of the day, what's important to me is that Blue Peter is still attracting a lot of viewers and entertaining children. I try and keep my head focussed on that and not get bogged down by what the papers are saying and who's putting me down."

Zoe's family details

• Dad, Joseph, works in the carpet industry

• Mum, Priscilla, has always been a housewife, but is a qualified hairdresser
  
• They, and Zoe's sister Naomi (25) still live in the Bangor house Zoe was born in
  
• Naomi has just finished a postgrad in Communications, Marketing & amp; PR and is now looking for a job in retail management
• Her other sister Lara is the showbiz correspondent for Northern Ireland's leading glossy magazine, The Ulster Tatler
  
• Her brother Julian (24) works in a Civil Engineer's office