Tameka 'Tiny' Harris recalls meeting T.I., 'No Scrubs' creation

While once again refuting rumors that her marriage to T.I. is in trouble, Tameka “Tiny” Harris reminisced about how the two first met more than a decade ago.

They’re both superstars now, but Tiny and T.I. had a pretty normal introduction. They didn’t meet on the red carpet or during a music video shoot like some celebrity couples. They met at the mall.

“Our first date [was] the day that we exchanged numbers at the mall. We ended up hooking back up like maybe an hour later,” Tiny told Arsenio Hall. According to the reality star, he didn’t sweep her off her feet with an expensive meal or bottle service at an upscale nightclub. Instead, they ate at the $3 café. Despite rumors to the contrary, 13 years later, they’re still going strong, according to Tiny.

She said she’s heard all the gossip about T.I. cheating and even moving out of their home into a bachelor pad, but their marriage is solid, she assured.

“It’s definitely not true,” said Tiny whose friends and family inform her about the rumors when they surface. “It gets to me from sometimes friends, sometimes my mom. People call. It’s going to get to me.”

Though they’re not thinking about divorce, according to Tiny, she didn’t suggest that there is never trouble in paradise for the “Family Hustle” stars.

“We’re just a regular couple. We fuss. We fight. We go through our things, but we’re still together,” she said.

Tiny talks about meeting T.I. below. Watch.

NEXT: Tiny talks about Kandi’s wedding, new music and “No Scrubs”>>

With a 13-year relationship under her belt, it’s no wonder that Tiny was invited to to stand up for Kandi Burruss at her wedding, which will be chronicled on Bravo’s “Kandi’s Wedding” special, premiering in June 1.

Tiny said the Coming to America-themed event will be one to remember for viewers.

“She stole the whole idea [from the film]. It was awesome. They really did a great job,” said Tiny who has considered creating new music with her former Xscape partner.

“We talk about doing [new music]. She be like, ‘Me and you can do something together,’” Tiny explained. Kandi isn’t willing to reunite with all the women of Xscape, but she has Tiny considering a return to the studio.

“I might do a song or two just to see what it do,” said Tiny whose previous collaboration with Kandi produced TLC’s hit “No Scrubs.”

“We were coming together to do a project for ourselves. We were sitting down, coming up with ideas, and when we wrote, we would always come up with a concept first. And she had a concept ’cause she had been, like, ‘I wanna talk about a screw-up, a guy that’s a screw-up that doesn’t have their own business in order,’” Tiny recalled for Rolling Stone.

“We brought it to life on our own song for ourselves, and then the producer She’kspere had played it for some of the powers that be at LaFace, and they immediately were like, we want this song for TLC,” said Tiny. “It was probably the best thing we probably could have ever, ever did by giving TLC that ‘No Scrubs’ record.…It gave me a Grammy. And two, it put us in a different light than just being artists. It gave us another outlet, like, ‘OK, these are songwriters. Grammy-winning songwriters.’ So it was a different category, a different level for my life. I had been a successful artist but never a successful writer.”

Get more of Tiny’s Rolling Stone interview here.

Watch Tiny on “Arsenio” below.

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