She'd waited years for this moment.

Before dawn on a perfect August morning, workers began to transform the Mansion in Voorhees into the hip, cool showplace that she and her groom, Sixers star Allen Iverson, wanted.

Yards of black silk were draped on the walls, and disco lights hung over a dance floor. For an altar, two flower-filled Gothic black urns were placed on marble pedestals. Place cards for tables with names such as "faith," "trust" and "commitment" adorned a silk-covered table decorated with an elaborate floral arrangement.

Outside, sunlight glistened off a swan-filled pond near cascading waterfalls. Trumpeters stood ready to signal guests' arrival.

Tawanna's cream-colored strapless dress from the Suky Rosan boutique fit perfectly, and her thick, shoulder-length curls were swept up princess-style under a veil. She was ready to go.

But Allen Iverson's mother wasn't. Ann Iverson was miles away at the Four Seasons hotel in Center City. At least a half-hour after the wedding was supposed to start Aug. 3, 2001, she waved and talked to passers-by before she got into her limousine.

Some guests who stepped outside the Mansion for a smoke were visibly frustrated. It would be after midnight before dinner would be served. Still, the wedding party waited.

For a moment, she stole the show. In many ways, it was Ann's day as much as it was Allen's and Tawanna's.

Now that Allen and Tawanna have marked their first year as a married couple, the spotlight is again aimed at the women in Iverson's turbulent life. Last month, Iverson, 27, racked up a slew of criminal charges after he allegedly barged into a West Philadelphia apartment looking for his wife. All but two misdemeanor charges have been dropped.

Through it all, both Ann and Tawanna have stood by their man. Ann, dressed in a Gucci suit, went to court with him, the book "Prayers" on her lap. Tawanna didn't go, but earlier last month she romped with her husband outside their Gladwyne mansion while the cameras rolled.

Though dramatically different in style, these two women are Allen's buffer in a world where he is both idolized and demonized.

He brought them fortune and fame, envy and strife. Ann relishes her role in the spotlight. Tawanna shrinks from it. Together, on opposite ends of the pendulum, they reflect a complex, sensitive, pained young man who few really know.

The Answer's mom

Ann used to say that "Bubba Chuck" was more like a brother than a son.

She claims to have conceived him at 1 a.m. on her 15th birthday without having had intercourse with her longtime boyfriend, a point guard and leader of a gang called the Family Connection.

Allen's father, Allen Broughton, disputes her story that Allen was conceived without penetration. Reached recently at Enfield Correctional Institution in Connecticut, the 5-foot-6, 160-pound Broughton laughed.

"Do you believe that?" he chuckled from the prison where he's nearing the end of a seven-year sentence for stabbing a girlfriend.

"Would anyone believe that?" he said. "It's not true. If you see me, and you see him, you'd know I'm the father. Don't I sound like him?"

Ann, whose mother died when she was 12, raised Allen with the help of her grandmother, her then-boyfriend, Michael Freeman, coaches, neighbors and friends.

When Allen was 3 years old, she told him, "You're the man of the house. You gotta do whatever you gotta do to become a man," according to a Sports Illustrated report last year.

Even as a teen-age mom, she managed to graduate in 1978 from Bethel High School in Hampton, Va., the same school where Allen would later became a basketball and football star. Along the way, she worked various jobs as a secretary, forklift operator, welder and convenience-store clerk.

Raising Allen and his two sisters was tough for this fun-loving woman, whom friends call "Juicy." Those who knew Allen recall that he was repeatedly late for high school because he had to care for his younger sister.

Dennis Kozlowski, Allen's football coach, arranged for his sister to be watched in home-economics class so Allen could attend classes.

Even when Allen came to school, he was frequently hungry and sometimes wasn't dressed properly, Kozlowski said. Once, during sophomore year, when Allen was supposed to wear a suit to an awards banquet, Kozlowski bought him an outfit at T.J. Maxx discount store.

Later, when Allen again showed up without a coat and tie, Kozlowski cornered him, demanding to know what he'd done with the suit.

"Coach, I don't have one," Allen told Kozlowski.

"Don't tell me you don't have one. I bought you one last year," Kozlowski retorted.

"I guess one of my mama's friends took it," Allen finally admitted.

When Allen was 14, Ann got evicted and moved into a shelter for homeless mothers. Allen wouldn't go and instead moved in with his old football coach, Gary Moore.

"I didn't hide none of it from him," she told Sports Illustrated. "Whenever I took a bump, he was right there with me."

Allen survived his chaotic home life by spending a lot of time during football and basketball season at other players' houses.

"It kept him out of harm's way," Kozlowski said.

His senior year, he went back to live with his mom and two sisters, said Susan Lambiotte, who used to tutor Allen.

"It meant a great deal to him. It was a real home life for him for the first time," she said. "She was always a great booster, supporter and believer in him, not just his talent, but about him being strong and overcoming adversity."

In some ways, Ann and Allen were two kids trying to make it.

"They grew up together," said Linwood "Butch" Harper, who has known Allen since birth. "She depends on him to be a strength to her. He depends on her for the same.

"I can remember when he was a little kid, maybe 9 or so, he said he'd buy her a house one day. He'd take care of the family," said Harper, a youth-program leader in the Hampton area.

And now Ann takes care of her hometown friends. "She's very generous," said family friend Selma Harper, 78. "She's given me TVs, couches, a washing machine, a stove, anything I needed."

Adversity put Ann and her son on the same page. To understand Ann, friends say, is to understand her son.

"Her son on the basketball court is Ann off the basketball court. They're very hard to maneuver," Harper said. "They're small guys in the big game. They win with wit instead of brawn.

"You couldn't get a thin sheet of paper between them - even today."

Charismatic, warm and approachable, Ann creates a spectacle at the First Union Center, anointing seats with holy oil. Sometimes wrapped in mink and sporting a few hundred thousand dollars' worth of jewelry, she signs autographs, poses for photographs and holds signs that say, "That's my boy. Number 3."

"She gets out of the car at the First Union Center and you'd think she was Allen Iverson," Butch Harper quipped.

In a recorded message on one of her phones, she identifies herself as "The Answer's mother."

"She's wild, but she's real," Harper said.

When Ann spoke out in defense of her son during the recent criminal charges, she was stung by critics who thought she overstepped her bounds.

"They made her look like a ghetto queen. I saw it as defense of a son," Harper said.

"She may be perceived as a dim-head, but she's aware of what's going on. She's very sharp. She knows real s--- from bulls---. You can't run anything past Ann."

When asked if Tawanna is like Ann, Harper shot back: "Who the hell is like Ann?"

The chosen one

Tawanna began dating Allen when they were 10th-graders at rival high schools in Hampton, Va. They were known as Bubba Chuck and Teedee.

Tawanna and her brother were raised by their mom, a hair stylist, after the death of their father, who had served in the Air Force.

Active in student government, she encouraged other black students to get involved. Voted "most attractive," Tawanna was reserved and unassuming.

Classmates described her as a self-assured, down-to-earth, confident girl who was tight-lipped about her love life. Most students and relatives didn't even know she was dating Iverson, who was well-known for his athletic prowess.

"There was a time when I didn't know," said Sheila Turner, Tawanna's mother.

These days, the first thing most say about Tawanna, 26, is she's a doting, caring mother. She's her own person, her own boss, in a quiet way.

Tawanna, Harper said, is about as unlike Iverson as you can get.

"Opposites attract," Harper said. "Every coin has two sides. You couldn't have two Allen Iversons. You need a neutralizer, a leveler. Tawanna keeps him focused, his feet on the ground."

Lambiotte, the tutor, noticed how Ann and Tawanna were a study in contrasts.

"Tawanna could be at a gathering with Bubba, and if you didn't know her, you probably wouldn't know she had any connection to him," she said.

"If Ann were there, you'd know immediately they were connected. She's very proud and affectionate in a public way."

Unlike Ann, Tawanna takes a back seat when out in public. Ann usually has the Iversons' two children, Allen II "Deuce," 4, and Tiaura, 7, sitting close to the action with her. Tawanna sits in the stands like any other fan.

At home inside their Gladwyne 15-room mansion, she and Ann get along. Most of the time.

"It's just like any other mother-in-law, daughter-in-law relationship," said an Iverson insider. "There's some good and some bad.

"She's the mother of Allen Iverson. You know that's going to weigh a lot more. Tawanna probably looks at Ann as somebody to learn from."

One year down

Little is known about how - or even if - the Iversons celebrated their first wedding anniversary on Saturday. Did they pop open a bottle of Cristal, the expensive champagne that kept flowing at their lavish wedding?

Did they devour the top layer of their delectable five-tiered sponge cake filled with lemon curd and fresh raspberries?

As their big day approached, Iverson's already tight inner circle seemed to close in around the couple last week.

But the memories of Philadelphia's wedding of the year linger: The veil of secrecy to keep the media away. The hordes of fans and reporters who camped after word spread about the location. The buzz of helicopters overhead. The busloads of attendees who were driven to the wedding site. The excited yells as Dikembe Mutombo, Eric Snow and Pat Croce stepped into the catering hall.

They lighted a unity candle and marched over red and pink rose petals to the song "Ease on Down the Road."

Finally, after dinner and dancing, the couple emerged at 2:30 a.m., relaxed and radiant. Allen uttered a few words to a few lingering press members and passed the Cristal bottle he was carrying to a fan. Tawanna stood by him, her arm linked in his, glowing but silent.

After they left, the crowd thought it was over.

It wasn't. Ann was still inside.

When she stepped into the night, Ann, who had on a glittery black dress, had a bouquet of red roses, orchids, coxcomb and other flowers in her hands, which she passed to fans, telling them to "Keep it real."

After all, this was her moment, too.