[2] She left home in 1990 at the age of 16, and moved to Melbourne, where she qualified as a hairdresser and beauty therapist.

Her life was changed that year by a fall from a building in Melbourne which fractured her third and fourth thoracic vertebrae, rendering her an incomplete paraplegic.

She spent the next four weeks in the Austin Hospital in Heidelberg, and then another two and a half months in the Royal Talbot Rehabilitation Centre in Kew.

[10] In 2000 and 2001, she played for the Whittlesea City Pacers in the Women's National Wheelchair Basketball League (WNWBL).

[12] In 2010, she played for St Peters and the Wenty Leagues Wheelkings,[13] and for the Stacks Goudkamp Bears in the WNWBL.

[16] McKenzie has over 100 international caps with the Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team,[9] generally known as the Gliders.

[2] She played in a four-game test series in Canberra against the Japan women's national wheelchair basketball team held in March 2002, the first Australian hosted international for the Gliders since the Paralympics.

[4] She was selected to represent Australia at the 2009 Four Nations tournament in Canada, one of six players in the side who played for the Dandenong Rangers in the WNWBL.

The first time was in her team's victory over Great Britain on 31 August, in which she played for 7 minutes 2 seconds.