[2] Mehle was born on June 10, 1918, in El Paso, Texas, the daughter of Aileen (O'Keefe) and Lawrence Herman Elder, an oil company employee.
[1][3] While living in Palm Beach, Mehle became friends with Jan Cox, the wife of the editor of The Miami Daily News.
Cox's husband overheard Mehle complaining about the quality of writing in his paper and invited her to submit sample columns; she did, and was hired to cover society news.
[4] In 1988, James Revson, a rival gossip columnist at Newsday, accused Mehle of fabricating some of the content of her columns.
[5][6] Mehle acknowledged that her writing was centred on the trivial and superficial, and that part of her goal was to bring some glamour to the lives of regular people.
[1] Her writing style was considered crisp and colourful,[6] and she was skilled at making flattering observations without risk of hurting a person's reputation.