EVERY young man who woos a young lady puts on his best clothes, straightens his tie, combs his hair, smiles his best smile and minds his manners.

He opens doors for her, he holds out her coat, he allows her choice of seat in the restaurant.

Some men are so anxious to impress that they pick up dirty underwear from the bedroom floor and they even put the toilet seat down.

As time wears on, as the courtship moves more towards marriage, things start to slip a little. Just little details - a phone call not responded to immediately, dishes left unwashed by the sink - through which he reveals his true self.

Of course, some men are truly chivalrous. Others are not.

Gordon Brown reminds me of a man who is courting. He's definitely smiling his best smile. He's certainly started combing his hair. And he's got a new aid to straighten his tie.

He is wooing both the Labour Party and - more importantly - the electorate and the country as a whole. His media manipulators are trying to show that he's not as grey, not as stiff, not as dour as we think he is.

This is modern politics. We are being sold a new, improved package of Gordon Brown - just as we were sold the new, green brand of David Cameron's Tories when he cycled into Westminster with a 4x4 chugging along behind carrying his shoes.

I think the public are sophisticated enough to see all of this. They can see the message - the new "listening and learning" Gordon or the environmentally aware David - but they can also see the spin.

They see through the spin - that's why Redcar's Mo Mowlam was so popular. She was thoroughly unspun, and the public responded very positively to her natural, unvarnished personality.

So two things have shone through Mr Brown's courtship this week for me.

Firstly, he has said he wants to create more apprenticeships. This is great - I know of an 18-year-old who wants to be an electrician but looks likely to have to leave the North-East because he cannot get an apprenticeship in his home region. So Gordon shows there is some substance behind his new image.

Secondly, I rather like the story about Mr Brown once grabbing former minister Frank Field by the lapels and yelling at him when they disagreed. This was supposed to be a shock revelation that would damage Mr Brown's leadership credentials, particularly as it came in the same Channel 4 programme that revealed he sulked when he didn't get his own way. This was the courtship ending, the smile slipping, and the real Mr Brown being revealed.

But we want a leader who cares so passionately about his ideas that he is prepared to jump up and down and shout about them. We want a leader who cares when he is defeated rather than lightly brushing it off and getting on with something else. We want a leader who takes defeat personally, who resolves to do better next time because he knows his ideas are so vital for the country that he cannot abide the thought of them falling by the wayside.

We all know that Mr Brown cannot go round "listening and learning" forever, he must do some leading as well. We all know he cannot stand at the Despatch Box smiling sweetly because Mr Cameron will tear into him.

So the spin of the smile and the soundbite will play its part in selling Mr Brown to the nation, but more important are the times when the manufactured mask slips and we see what we are really getting.

And I like what I see in the man who will be married to the country as Prime Minister.