John Edwards' Mistress Rielle Hunter and Her Colorful World

May 16, 2012— -- She had him at "You are so hot."

Not exactly the standard greeting for a former senator seeking the highest office in the country, but with that three-word come on, Rielle Hunter, a sometime videographer with a passion for astrology, bewitched John Edwards. The rest: the affair, the baby, the cover-up, is history.

Both the government and Edwards' defense lawyers long ago put Hunter -- described in the press as "kooky" and "New Agey" -- on their witness lists. The prosecution did not call her as a witness before resting its case. But now Hunter, known in part for being unpredictable, is listed as a possible witness today.

Despite that listing, it's not certain that Ewards' lawyer are any more willing than the prosecutors to put her on the stand.

So why is Hunter so often described as off-beat?

That Business Card

That Photo Spread

Wearing an unbuttoned men's dress shirt, Hunter bared her legs and midriff on a rumpled bed. Some of the photos included 2-year-old daughter Frances Quinn, while other photos included Hunter sexily posing amid Quinn's stuffed dolls, including Kermit the Frog, Barney, and Dora the Explorer.

Hunter later told ABC News' Barbara Walters she was "repulsed" by the photos and "cried for two hours" when she saw them.

That Name and That Other Name and Another

But it doesn't stop there. On her daughter's birth certificate (which does not include the girl's father's name) Hunter used the alias Rielle Jaya James Druck.

While Hunter was receiving hush money from Edwards' donors, aide Andrew Young testified, she received an American Express credit card in the fake name Jaya James. She picked the name, she said, because it sounded like Jesse James, the famed Western outlaw. When the card arrived, it read "Randy Jaya James" and Hunter refused to use it. It was later reprinted "R. Jaya James."

That Voodoo That You Do

For much of Edwards' campaign and Hunter's pregnancy, she was hidden away from the press, staying in ritzy hotels around the country. Often if a room was not to her liking, she would complain of it not "having the right energy."

Hunter often consulted her New Age spiritual adviser Bob McGovern for advice and healing. McGovern not only accompanied Hunter to the hospital when she delivered Quinn, but was on call when she needed him following a breakdown at an Aspen, Colo., restaurant when the Reuben sandwich she ordered came with the wrong dressing.

That Living Arrangement

In sworn testimony Cheri Young described the first day Hunter came to move in with them. Hunter walked into their North Carolina home, "took a spin and opened her arms out and said, 'I'm here!'"

Things, Cheri said, "grew tense pretty quickly" with Hunter around the house, especially after she delivered the baby.

"We couldn't touch the baby," Cheri said adding that the Young's two small children "weren't allowed to be close enough where they could breathe on the baby."

That Even Worse Excuse

That Author Alison Poole, the narrator of Jay McInerney's 1988 novel "Story of My Life," was based on Hunter, whom the author dated in the 1980s. McInerney once described Poole in an interview as a "cocaine-addled, sexually voracious 20-year-old."

Poole, like Hunter, was an aspiring actress whose father raised horses and was involved in a scandal in which some horses were killed. Hunter has admitted to partying hard and using drugs in the 1980s.

"I knew her in the '80s... She and her friends inspired a book that I wrote called 'Story of my Life,' and we had a lot of fun back then," McInerney recently told CBS News.

Through the 1980s and early 1990s Hunter appeared in a handful of films, including the Denzel Washington picture "Ricochet."

Poole, like Hunter, was an aspiring actress whose father raised horses and was involved in a scandal in which some horses were killed. Hunter has admitted to partying hard and using drugs in the 1980s.

"I knew her in the '80s... She and her friends inspired a book that I wrote called 'Story of my Life,' and we had a lot of fun back then," McInerney recently told CBS News.

Through the 1980s and early 1990s Hunter appeared in a handful of films, including the Denzel Washington picture "Ricochet."