"Diva" is a much used and abused word. Whitney Houston, arguably the epitome of that term, finds it amusing.

"I wake up and look at myself in the mirror in the morning and I think: `Diva? I don't know about that!' " the singer said with a hearty laugh during a phone interview. "It takes a couple of hours at least to turn into a diva."

Maybe so, but with her soaring powerhouse of a voice, Houston probably influenced more female singers than any other artist in the '80s and '90s. And she was looking and sounding pretty darn divaesque when she came to Chicago last week to tape an episode of "The Oprah Winfrey Show" that aired Monday.

Houston returns to kick off her world tour with performances tonight and Wednesday at the Arie Crown Theatre. As for how Chicago got this honor, Houston said, "It's just a scheduling thing." Then, lest she disappoint one of her most loyal fan bases, she added: "But Chicago's always a hot place to play. I just remember the days of touring and coming here, and it was always such a great place to gig. It's gonna be good."

The daughter of R&B and gospel singer Cissy Houston and the cousin of pop star Dionne Warwick, Whitney spent much of her formative years on the road. Despite some lengthy breaks over the last few years, she claims she never has really gotten touring out of her blood.

She started her career by singing backup for Chaka Khan and Lou Rawls while simultaneously branching out into acting and modeling. (As a teen, she appeared on the covers of Seventeen and Glamour magazines.) But all of that was just an appetizer for the main course.

After being "discovered" by Clive Davis, who signed her to Arista Records in 1985, Houston went on to score one of the best-selling debut albums ever by a female singer (she's still No. 2 only to Alanis Morissette). In subsequent years, she scored a string of No. 1 pop and R&B singles, won five Grammy Awards, and appeared in several films, some of them huge hits ("The Bodyguard" and "Waiting to Exhale") and some not quite so successful ("The Preacher's Wife").

The current tour is tied to last year's "My Love Is Your Love," Houston's first non-soundtrack album in eight years. It attempted to infuse her traditionally lush and romantic sound with a bit of hip-hop street edge, courtesy of appearances by Wyclef Jean, Missy Elliott and Lauryn Hill.

"You're constantly growing and constantly learning, but you're constantly sharing," Houston said of working with her hip-hop collaborators. "That's the thing that I found most rewarding--that I had a chance to share with a lot of my young brothers and sisters starting out who became successful very quickly and who are the hottest producers in the industry right now.

"It gave me a chance to talk with them and to share with them my experience that it's all about long-standing careers. If you have a long-standing career, everybody wants to know how you do it."

The secret? "It's always about placing God first in your life," Houston said. "Even if you go off track a little bit, you'll always come back home. That's the first thing. Keep it real. If what you do well is producing or writing, then do that and give it all you've got."

Of course, there can be obstacles. One is trying to juggle the responsibilities of family--including her young daughter, Bobbi Kristina--with the grind of touring. On this topic Houston sounds like a lot of working moms.

"I try to put things in their right spots," she said. "Juggling is like a last-minute job, so I don't like to juggle. I like to have things in order.

"I know I'm going on tour this summer and my daughter's going with me. In the fall, I have to go to Europe, and she won't be able to come, so I have to arrange for that moment emotionally and stability-wise. For me, it's hard to be away from her. But I try to create an atmosphere on tour as if I'm at home. I bring my nieces and nephews, my daughter, my family."

Among other worries, Houston has to contend with constant tabloid speculation about the state of her marriage to singer Bobby Brown.

"It's disturbing, and it's distracting to people who really wanna hear music, who love singing and who love Whitney," she said. "You distract them with all these other things that come into their minds. I know that they're thinking: `I wonder, I wonder.' But basically I hope that when I come to sing, that will tell you and show you how I'm feeling--how my life is. I'm still in love with God, I'm still in love with my husband, I've got a great marriage. I'm doing good. I couldn't do a tour if I was emotionally not right. It's just too demanding."

As for the future, Houston plans to continue her movie work. "It's not like I try to do more acting," she said. "If a script comes up and it's really good and it's something I think I can really do, then I'll do it.

"I've got a project coming up next year with Will Smith [`Anything for Love']. It's a movie that I think is the cutest romantic comedy about two African-Americans I've ever encountered."

And in time for Christmas, she will release a greatest hits album, spanning her nearly 15-year solo career. It will recap many of the hits that she'll be singing at the Arie Crown.

"They were all wonderful moments for me," Houston said. "I think about those times from `Saving All My Love for You' to `Where Do Broken Hearts Go,' and those are moments that I will never forget, that I cherish and love. People love those moments, too. Me going on tour is not about what I want to do, but what the people want to hear."