Editing Tina Arena (section)

=== 1967–1987: Early life and career beginnings ===
Arena was born in the [[Melbourne]] suburb of [[Keilor East]], to Giuseppe "Joe" Arena and Francesca "Franca" Catalfamo (both from [[Valguarnera Caropepe|Valguarnera]], Sicily), [[Sicily|Sicilian]] [[Immigration to Australia|immigrants]], in Melbourne on 1 November 1967.<ref name="Arena's Auto">{{cite book | last1 = Arena |first1 = Tina | last2 = McGee | first2 = Jude | date = 14 October 2013 | title = Now I Can Dance | url= https://books.google.com/books?id=eCc7Wxw8QpIC&q=father | location = Sydney, NSW | publisher = [[HarperCollins]] | isbn = 978-0-7322-9756-5 }}</ref><ref name="NAA Giuseppe"/><ref name="Elliott"/> Giuseppe was a rural worker in [[Sicily]] and then a cane cutter in Cairns in 1955. By the following year he was a labourer in Melbourne and later worked for [[Victorian Railways]].<ref name="Arena's Auto"/>{{rp|7}}<ref name="NAA Giuseppe">{{cite web | url = http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/NameSearch/Interface/ItemDetail.aspx?Barcode=12369587 | title = Item details for: B44, V1970/6362 Arena, Giuseppe | publisher = [[National Archives of Australia]] | date = 27 May 2008 | access-date = 27 October 2015 }}{{Dead link|date=January 2019 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> Arena grew up in Keilor East, Victoria with two sisters, Nancy and Silvana;<ref name="Elliott"/> As a child, she listened to Spanish, Italian and French songs that were in her family's record collection. At the age of six, she was the flower girl at her cousin Gaetano's wedding, and at the reception she urged her father to approach the host so that she could sing—[[Daryl Braithwaite]]'s version of "[[You're My World]]"—it was her first public performance.<ref name="talking heads">{{cite web | url = http://www.abc.net.au/tv/talkingheads/txt/s2487384.htm | title = Tina Arena – Transcript | work = [[Talking Heads with Peter Thompson]] | publisher = [[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]] (ABC) | date = 16 February 2009 | access-date = 27 October 2015 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20151215101302/http://www.abc.net.au/tv/talkingheads/txt/s2487384.htm | archive-date = 15 December 2015 | url-status = dead | df = dmy-all }}</ref>

Arena's family call her Pina, which is her shortened first name. She changed her first name from Filippina to ''Tina'', her stage name becoming ''Tina Arena'', when she appeared as a child performer on the national television talent show ''[[Young Talent Time]]'' in 1976, at age 8.<ref name="talking heads"/><ref name="ReferenceD">{{Cite web|url=https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/meet-tina-arena-the-taxi-driver/news-story/9357a32f371b3030b93f8d406def863e|title=Meet Tina Arena: the taxi driver|date=11 April 2012|website=NewsComAu}}</ref><ref name="themusic.com.au">{{Cite web|url=https://themusic.com.au/news/all/2017/09/07/making-music-means-selling-it-and-other-things-we-learnt-from-tina-arenas-bigsound-keynote/|title=/|website=The Music|access-date=12 August 2019|archive-date=12 August 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190812134054/https://themusic.com.au/news/all/2017/09/07/making-music-means-selling-it-and-other-things-we-learnt-from-tina-arenas-bigsound-keynote/|url-status=dead}}</ref> For secondary schooling, she attended a Catholic girls' college, [[St. Columba's College, Essendon]], in Melbourne.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/lunch-with-tina-arena-20140906-10bzw4.html|title=Lunch with Tina Arena|first=Michael|last=Lallo|date=12 September 2014|website=The Sydney Morning Herald}}</ref> Recalling her upbringing, Arena says, "It was a very Italian household, it was a very traditional household. There was a lot of love but there was a lot of discipline. And there was no room for pretentiousness. Really, there just wasn't."<ref name="talking heads"/>