In the weeks leading up to yesterday’s Live 8 concert there were two reunions on the cards: the fluffy girl power pop of Posh, Ginger, Sporty, Baby and Scary and the solemn rock of Roger, Dave and Nick. Pink Floyd made it. The Spice Girls prevaricated.

As the date approached the rumours intensified. Last Monday the Spice Girls would perform; on Wednesday only some of them would; and on Friday — as Driving went to press — none of them would.

The cause for this confusion, seen through the distorting prism of agents and gossip pages, appeared to focus on the woman once known as Scary Spice. There were reports that she thought the reunion plans too rushed, there was the ongoing spat with Geri Halliwell and that she had clashing commitments. She even resisted a phone call from St Bob himself.

But the real reason, she explains, is the fact that her star sign says she can’t go back over old ground. Then she was Mel B. Now she is Melanie Brown. Time has passed and she’s not the person she was, she says — and it’s the same with her choice of car.

“I used to drive a Mercedes SLK and I thought that was good too but I never backtrack — I’m a Gemini and I can’t repeat. I’ve got to move onward and forward all the time.”

Moving forward means a home in Los Angeles and a Cadillac Escalade — fully pimped up with big wheels, body-kit wheelarches and a diamond white paint job. It is as loud and unsubtle as its owner.

“I’ve got a six-year-old girl and a big labrador dog and we go surfing and boogie boarding, so an Escalade is just perfect for me,” she explains. “But nobody can drive in LA and the freeways are hectic because everyone’s enjoying the sun too much. They’re so chilled out they forget how to drive.”

She says she is also about to buy a Mercedes SL (the SLK’s beefier brother) — with all the trimmings: Distronic cruise control to maintain a safe distance behind another car, Sirius satellite radio that identifies the songs playing and tells you which album they come from, and the Keyless Go system that recognises the driver and starts up at the touch of a button.

“I’ve always had a big car and a little car together and I think the Escalade and the SL will make a perfect pair,” she says.

Mel B (as she is still best known) moved out to LA in 2003 after her post Spice Girls career took a dive in this country. A show she had been hosting on ITV1 was axed after poor ratings and she agreed to part company with Virgin Records following disappointing sales of her first solo album Hot.

She’d also been through a divorce after just 16 months of marriage to Jimmy “Goldcard” Gulzar, a Spice Girls backing dancer and the father of her daughter Phoenix. The nickname is the result of a reported £1.2m settlement she paid him.

Her divorce settlement and the collapse of the Spice Girls does not appear to have dented her finances — she is believed to have earned £20m from the Spice Girls before they split. Certainly there was a time when she could have been driving a Jaguar, an Aston Martin or a Lamborghini as her “small car” alongside a string of Land Rovers for her “big car”.

She’s still got three scooters (one in Amsterdam, one in Paris and one in Leeds) currently being looked after by friends on her behalf and at least one more in America. She says she rides them whenever she visits her mates but otherwise she’s content to know that they are well cared for.

She began to audition for film roles in America and appeared as an eco-warrior in LD 50 Lethal Dose, and a pop diva’s friend in the equally unknown The Seat Filler before landing the role of Mimi in the musical Rent on Broadway. Now she is promoting her new album, LA State of Mind.

“I haven’t wanted anything to do with music for five years,” she admits, before explaining the genesis of her latest project. “I wrote this album a year ago when I was bored. I wrote it for me, nobody else. So I did a deal: I would let it out for two weeks’ publicity in England and that’s all. Everything has to be on my terms now.”

Perhaps this explains her reluctance to join the other Spice Girls, with whom she made her name. The group was never a family of equals and by all accounts Mel B was never shy about calling the shots. Scary Spice’s bossy northern-lass image was no construction — it was real.

However, she hasn’t quite purged her life of Spice Girl memories. She has kept her first car as a memento of the success she enjoyed with the group. With her first pay cheque 10 years ago she bought an Alfa Romeo roadster. Now that too is looked after by her mother in Leeds.

“My mum drives it so she won’t let me in it any more — it’s her car as far as she’s concerned,” she laughs. “I like roadsters and anything where the roof goes down. I don’t like Ferraris, I ain’t a Ferrari girl, and I don’t like Porsches at all. I think that’s a middle-age crisis motor.

“But one car that I absolutely adore, and I will get one at some point in my life, is the old Lamborghini with the doors that open up. They’re so over the top you have to love them.”

On her CD changer

Tracy Chapman — her first album. It is so chilled out and her lyrics are so profound. Jack Johnson, Brushfire Fairytales — it’s very summer. Toby Lightman, Little Things — very country so you can sing along. Gwen Stefani and Busted because Phoenix loves them