Barbara Jean "Barbie" Blank (born January 15, 1987) is an American model, professional wrestling valet, dancer, and wrestler better known by her ring name Kelly Kelly. She currently works for the WWE on their ECW brand.
Blank was a bikini model for Hawaiian Tropic and Venus Swimwear when World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) Vice President of Talent Relations John " Ace" Laurinaitis offered her a developmental contract with WWE. Despite having no previous wrestling experience she accepted the contract and was assigned to the WWE's developmental territory, Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW) for training. Even after being called up to WWE's main roster she continued to fly back and forth to OVW's base city, Louisville, Kentucky, once a week to work shows; first as a ring announcer and referee then as a wrestler. One of her first matches took place at the September 6 OVW TV tapings where she participated in a Women's battle royal won by ODB.
Blank debuted for the Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) brand as Kelly Kelly on the first episode of the weekly television program—June 13, 2006—becoming the youngest diva on the WWE roster. Her character, an exhibitionist, was introduced performing a striptease for the crowd. The next week, while performing another striptease, Kelly was interrupted by her (kayfabe) boyfriend, Mike Knox, who came to the stage and covered her with a towel before dragging her backstage. Her stripping became a weekly segment known as Kelly's Exposé and usually followed the same routine; Kelly would dance and strip until she was interrupted by Knox who was "upset" by her exhibitionism and showing of her body to others. Eventually Knox began "forcing" Kelly to accompany him to ringside so he could keep an eye on her, making her his de facto valet. As a result, she found herself involved in the feud developing between Mike Knox and partner Test with Tommy Dreamer and his partner The Sandman, including being dragged into the ring and spanked by Dreamer and (kayfabe) inadvertently hit with a cane by Sandman when Knox used her as a shield. She made her ECW in-ring debut on the August 22, 2006 episode of ECW on Sci-Fi in a losing effort as part of a six-person Mixed tag team match which saw herself, Knox, and Test lose to Dreamer, Sandman and Torrie Wilson, in what became the blow off match for the feud.
Following this feud, Kelly and Knox were moved into an angle with CM Punk in which Kelly seemed to have a crush on Punk, causing Knox to become increasingly protective and jealous. Things came to a head when Kelly dressed as Punk for ECW's "Halloween Costume Contest," enraging Knox, and leading to a match between the two, during which Kelly cheered for Punk. After those problems Kelly and Knox started on the roads towards a break-up. At the December to Dismember pay-per-view they took on the team of Ariel and Kevin Thorn in a mixed tag match, during which Knox refused to allow Kelly to tag him in before abandoning her altogether, leaving her to be beaten badly by Ariel. On the following edition of ECW, Kelly defeated Ariel with a roll-up in her first ECW singles match, after which Knox made his way to the ring with flowers only to throw them in Kelly's face and hit her with his signature swinging reverse STO, ending their relationship and (kayfabe) injuring her, taking her off the show for six weeks.
She returned to television on January 16, 2007 and cut a promo announcing she was newly single and bringing back Kelly's Exposé. The next week Extreme Exposé debuted, a spin-off to the previous Exposé segment involving not just Kelly but Brooke and Layla performing choreographed dances in the ECW ring. The trio danced nearly-weekly for the next few months, tapering off when Mike "The Miz" Mizanin was moved to ECW in the June draft lottery and all three ladies began actively pursuing him. Later, however, Kelly shifted her attentions towards the much more slovenly looking Balls Mahoney, to the amusement of Miz and her Exposé sisters who spent their time mocking his look. After Brooke was released from the company in November, Extreme Exposé dissolved and Kelly began taking part in more wrestling matches, immediately starting a feud with Layla.
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