The bright lights of New York City

After she graduated from high school and winning a Madonna lookalike competition, Michelle moved to New York City when she was still a teenager.

She studied at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in Manhattan for two years and her mother Arlene gave her a fake ID so she could make connections to help further her career.

Michelle became prominent in the club scene and the New York drag ball scene, and the friends she made during that period in her life made her a lifelong advocate for the LGBTQ+ community.

Lamenting on the friends she lost due to the AIDS crisis and substance abuse to The Guardian, she said: "So many of the people that I’d known through the ballroom scene are gone. To see that many people go, and to see relatives not come to their funerals because of the shame, it just wasn’t necessary. It was so tragic.

"I lost a lot of friends in that community ... Just dangerous living. These kids needed to be taken care of.”