LOOK OUT JLO! IT'S JLOVE!

Jennifer Love Hewitt and "BareNaked" record producer Meredith Brooks at the 2002 American Music Awards. Love co-wrote some of the songs with Meredith Brooks.

by Sean Daly

Jennifer Love Hewitt gave her first live musical performance in front of 6,000 screaming fans during the taping of the 2002 Teen Choice Awards on August 4, 2002 in Los Angeles, CA.

“What I just did is possibly the best thing I have ever felt in my whole life,” Hewitt, 23, told reporters just moments after belting out “BareNaked,” the titular opening single from her upcoming CD. “I think her performance was hot,” said platinum-selling singer Ashanti. Malcolm in the Middle star Frankie Muniz was also impressed: “I’ve never heard her sing before, but she was really, really good.”

Still, Hewitt admits she was a bit nervous singing and dancing in front of Britney, Justin, Mandy and the rest of today’s top teen pop stars. “I didn’t know whether to pee or sing when I saw them,” she laughed. “I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ So I just pretended they were not here and I just sang to the kids that wouldn’t throw things at me.”

Hewitt says she wrote the song “for every 14-year-old girl to know when she starts school this year that there is someone else in the world that is just as insecure and it’s me.” And when she’s having a bad day, Hewitt says she finds inspiration in a quote her mother once shared: “Dance like no one is watching, love like your heart has never been broken and work like you don’t need the money.”