As Elaine Biss looks at her digital watercolor of a tall blond afloat in the ruffles of her sea-green ballroom gown, she sees Cinderella.

"I like the girl who, nobody knows who she is, but everybody thinks she must be somebody because she's beautiful," Biss of Lancaster said.

Biss is talking about her artwork, but she could just as easily have been talking about herself.

Known in her early Cinderella days as Sonia Leon, the fashion illustrator and Web designer used to be a 16-year-old, married, pregnant, high school dropout. Within nine years she had five children and had been divorced, homeless and married again, this time to Shayne Biss.

"I breastfed for 10 years," Biss said ruefully.

But she never lost her confidence in her talent, her value or her beauty — credit which she gives to her mother. She never stopped believing that her destiny lies far beyond the bounds of Lancaster County.

Unlike Cinderella, Biss didn't need a fairy godmother to get her there. She relied on her own determination and confidence.

Now Biss, who is 32, has two thriving Web-based businesses, and her fashion illustration recently was chosen for a Dior charity auction.

However, it took time and effort to get from cleaning cinders to Cinderella's ball.

The year after her first son was born, she returned to McCaskey High School to finish her training in graphic arts at Lancaster County Career & Technology Center.

Commercial art, body sketches, fashion sketches, product illustration — "We would go from genre to genre. We couldn't miss a beat," Biss said.

Although she has taken various online classes and taught herself many skills, Biss said it was her teacher, Linda Hilgert, who gave her the foundation she needed.

Hilgert, now retired, remembers Biss: "She was always doodling, and it is actually amazing, as her whimsical style is the same now as it was in high school. That is unusual, as most students take years to truly develop a style that they can market as their own."

Biss also had the personality to succeed, Hilgert said — happy, bubbly, enthusiastic, likable — combined with drive and determination.

"She was always going to get somewhere and make it," Hilgert said.

That determination is what brought Biss' art to the attention of Dior, a luxury fashion and beauty house. Biss learned about a contest to be Dior's featured artist in its auction. She submitted her work, and it was chosen. Her digital illustration was part of a package that brought $3,381.01.

The white on black design was a version of Biss' personal logo that features a coquettish fashionista surrounded by floating, fun things she loves and wishes she had — hearts, butterflies, shoes, purses, candy, diamonds and more.

"I feel that having a positive spin to things just gives it that much energy," Biss said.

Biss portrays the playful, the frilly, the chic, the flouncy, the French and the elegant throughout much of her art work — often with a splash of pink — which reflects, in part, who Biss is, she admits.

"We all in our heads think we're 16 (years old) and a size 0," Biss said. "All my girls are always drawn in that manner. We're all beautiful even if we don't think so. In our heads we're definitely cute, definitely cute."

The women Biss draws usually have her own little nose and slanted eyes, which come from some combination of her Latin and Asian heritage.

And they have her legs. Many of her drawings feature women with muscular, long and shapely legs.

"I am obsessed with legs. I love legs with muscle," Biss, who likes her own legs, said.

"I don't think my toes are cute, but definitely my legs are kind of nice. They are longer than my torso," Biss said.

Her fashion illustrations represent women who can accept a compliment on their looks and women who are willing to enhance their best assets, she said.

The images are integral to the two successful Web-based businesses she started.

One business, at elainebissdesigns.com, is about helping women start their own Web-based business. That, of course, requires a Web site, which Biss will design or help someone create. She teaches clients how to position their site so it gets noticed.

The other business, which she loves most, is fashion illustration. The designs she shows on elainebiss.com all are created on the computer with artistic software that allows her to create drawings that look like they're composed with watercolors, oils, charcoal sketching or other media.

Clients buy her images to use on their Web sites, MySpace accounts, Facebook pages, blogs and paper-based products. A customized icon can cost between $150 and $200, she said.

Customers who are drawn to her work tend to love lighthearted haute couture as much as Biss does.

Ruta Fox, owner of Divine Diamonds in New York, hired Biss to help establish a blog, Sparkle Plenty, which Fox describes as "clean and easy to read." Fox, whose Ah (available and happy) diamond ring has been featured on Oprah, wanted the additional Web presence.

The Ah ring, which is for "joyful, confident women," matches the positive energy Biss brings to her work, Fox said.

That playful, girly side of Biss is evident on Erika Jemison-Barnes's Web site, www.mymimipie.com.  The whimsical pastel pink site, accented with lime green and butterflies and hearts, appeals to moms who buy her custom-made cards and invitations, Jemison-Barnes of California said.

Biss created the Web site and a business icon, which looks like a young African-American fairy princess. Eventually, Biss also created sister fairy princesses who look Asian, Hispanic and Anglo. Jemison-Barnes uses all four on birthday party invitations.

"I like her style because it's so hip and chic," Jemison-Barnes said. "It's almost whimsical."

Biss continues to develop her talent by taking Internet classes and doing research, one of the attributes Fox values.

If Biss doesn't know something when Fox asks, she will find out quickly and be able to explain and advise her, Fox said.

Eventually, Biss hopes to enroll at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. She has her sights set on doing fashion illustration for Vogue, and she said Glamour magazine already is looking at her work.

Biss now is content selling her products to the entire world from little old Lancaster, even as she cares for her five dogs and enjoys her five children, ages 5-14 — home-schooling two of them at 6 a.m. and going to their soccer games.

"My husband helps a lot," Biss said.

Biss looks back on the worst of the days spent cleaning the cinders from the fireplace and acknowledges that they were tough.

"But you can't give up on the things that matter," Biss said. As cliché as it may sound, she said, "Tomorrow is another day. Go and try again. Let's just try, and you'll see, something happens."

E-mail: lespenshade@lnpnews.com