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E! Entertainment Special: Selena Gomez premieres on June 29th, interview excerpts

By April MacIntyre Jun 16, 2011, 18:18 GMT

06/05/2011 - Selena Gomez - 2011 MTV Movie Awards - Arrivals - Gibson Amphitheatre - Universal City, CA, USA © Andrew Evans / PR Photos

Tune in alert for Selena Gomez as E! Entertainment Special: Selena Gomez explores the life of this 19-year old beauty from her early days in Texas through her first acting auditions to the mega-success she enjoys today. 

Gomez opens up to E! about her life so far, including what it was like to be bullied in school, her relationship with BFF Demi Lovato, and her thoughts on dating a fellow superstar.  Helping to tell Selena’s story are brand-new interviews with her mother, father, step-father, good friend Taylor Swift and many others. The most intimate portrait to date of this budding A-lister, the E! Entertainment Special: Selena Gomez premieres on June 29th at 10:00 PM ET/PT only on E!

Selena on her parent’s divorce: 

“I wanted a family so bad. I wanted to have my dad and my mom together. So it was really, it was really hard,” her mother Mandy Teefey adds, “It was very hard for her. And, she didn’t understand. You know, it was like destroying her family. All we could do is just say, ‘I’m sorry, but you will understand one day.’” Selena goes on to say, “My mom was the best. She was, really, she was everything.”

Selena’s cousin, Pricilla De Leon, on the actress being teased at school -

“We had some really mean girls in our school and they would just be like ‘oh she’s on Barney, she’s a big baby’ and just tease her,”

Selena on being a role model: 

“I never really said I want to be a role model. But then when it happened I was so down for it. Once I realized that I’d have a little girl come to [me] and say she wants to be just like [me]. It [is] beautiful and I accept it. I’m human, I’m not perfect. I make mistakes all the time, but I guess my job is to keep those mistakes to myself, which I’m already fine doing and just try to be the best I can be for those kids.”

Selena on fame:

“This is a very superficial job. I sit in a chair for two hours and get hair and makeup done and talk about [myself] in interviews. That’s a very vain thing to do. And I do get caught up in it sometimes. I do.”

Good friend Taylor Swift on the time she and Selena went to the University of Notre Dame to visit  Taylor’s brother: "So we fly to Notre Dame and decide  we’re gonna fit in. We went and we got all this Notre Dame gear so we’re like wearing the Notre Dame jacket and the Notre Dame visor and we learned that’s not how you fit in at college evidently. As we were walking around masses of people ended up following us. And yes they had to call security but it’s all we have that’s close to a normal college experience.”

The E! Entertainment Special: Selena Gomez premieres on June 29th, 2011 at 10:00 PM, ET/PT.