As they were getting ready to embark on their first major U.S. tour, Backstreet Boys invited TEEN PEOPLE to hang with them at their home base in Orlando and on the L.A. set of their newest video, "I'll Never Break Your Heart." We learned that, as tight as this group may be, the Boys are still total individuals.

At 18, Nickolas Gene Carter is the group's youngest member. He's also the tallest (six-feet-one), the blondest and the most popular. Which is why he's having a hard time convincing the record company rep to let him wear his hair n a multitude of funk braids for the band's new video.

It'll look phat," Nick insists, intent on modeling his look on Cloud, a character in PlayStations's Final Fantasy VII game. Finally, a compromise is reached: no raids, but a definitely edgier-than-usual 'do that complements Nick's futuristic get-up and plastic bubble gun.

With his cherubic face and his obsession with toys and comic books (he plans on drawing an official Backstreet Boys series), Nick is every inch the baby Boy. But he's not as innocent as he seems. A five-year music industry veteran, he's more business-minded - and more worldly - than his band mates were when they were 18.

"I can't imagine having to deal with what we have to deal with now at his age," says Nick's best pal Brian Littrell, 23. "When I was eighteen, we weren't a hot commodity. I got to ease into it."

Nick, on the other hand, has a hard time remembering what it was like not to be in high demand. Only 13 when he joined up with the Boys, Nick worked with a full-time tutor from junior high on; this past spring, he received his high school graduate diploma in a hotel room while the group was on the road.

Missing out on high school doesn't bother Nick, but missing out on everyday things - like shooting hoops - does. "I love basketball. Just to play, period," says Nick, who once dreamed of playing college ball. "I could be so much better, but I don't have the time."

He laments not having time for a girlfriend either. "Takes devotion," he says of a relationship, adding, "A few of the other guys have had girlfriends in the past, and it just didn't work."

Nevertheless, the Carter home near Tampa, Fla., remains a magnet for girls who sit - sometimes all day long - with their faces pressed against the eight-foot-high fence. Nick takes advantage of nearby Tampa Bay for his escape from all the attention, spending time aboard his boat. Sometimes he brings his family - sisters Bobbi Jean, 16; Lesley, 12; and Angel, 10 (whose twin brother, Aaron, is the clan's newest singing sensation); dad Bob, his career advisor; and mom Jane, who manages Aaron. But often, he sets sail alone. "The ocean does something to me that is unexplainable," Nick says. "Just being out there and realizing I'm alive."

Brian Littrell is lucky to be alive. When he was five years old, his heart suddenly stopped beating for about 30 seconds.

"I remember them taking me out of bed an putting me in a tub of ice to cool my body off," the Lexington, Ky., native says of the nightmarish hospital stay that doctors said should have been his last. "Then they put me back in bed with only a sheet to cover me. Ten minutes later, they put me back in the ice. This kept up for an hour. Then I blacked out."

His mom, Jackie, watched as her son's eyes rolled back in his head. Warned that Brian, his heart weakened and infected, probably wasn't going to make it, she did the only thing she could: pray. "I just had faith inside that this wasn't the end for Brian," says Jackie. "God just reached down and touched that child, and he started on his way up."

Eighteen years later, the Littrells, Jackie and Harold, found themselves once again worrying about the health of their younger son (Brian's brother, Harold Jr., is 26). Last November, doctors discovered that the congenital hole in Brian's heart had caused the organ to enlarge considerably: If it wasn't operated on soon, his life could be in danger.

"My initial though was, 'Great timing!'" Brian says, sighing. The Boys were finally successful in the U.S., thanks to their first chart-topping single, "Quit Playing Games With My Heart)." Two months without a lead singer would seriously impact the group. So, for the benefit of his band - and against his parents' wishes - Brian put off the procedure for six months. (He finally underwent surgery in May and is now fully recovered.) Brian's mom resigned herself to his decision: "He's always been a team player."

And a fighter. Jackie recalls Brian's annual attempts to join his high school basketball team: "He never made it, because of his size." Finally, after getting cut yet again his junior year, the church choirboy made an announcement. "I learned something today," he said. "I can play ball as good as any of those guys, but none of them can sing like me."

And now he's got the fans to prove it.

Howard Dorough, Howie D. for short, is known to the others as Sweet D. "once, when we couldn't sign autographs because there were too many fans, he was too nice and stopped, and got trampled by them," says A.J. McLean, Howie's pal of 10 years and his BSB cofounder. "He fell down like a turtle on its back, his feet kicking up."

Good-natured Howie, 24, loves to give back to his fans. While the other Boys vacationed during Bran's recovery this past spring, Howie made appearances in South America, where his Puerto Rican heritage (on his mom's side) and his Spanish speaking skills (he's even appeared on Spanish soap operas) have made him incredibly popular.

Howie has bee acting and singing since he was a kid, but his first real love was dancing. "I was in an all-boy ballet group one time," says the Orlando native (and arguably the Boys' best dancer). "It was cool as heck."

But then came a talent competition in Howie's senior year. "When I sang 'Unchained Melody,' I hit the high note and got a standing ovation," he says. "When I was done, they didn't even want to [see] any more people. They were ready to give me the award."

Now the falsetto in a wildly successful singing group, Howie couldn't be happier. Well, actually, he could - if BSB's detractors would stop criticizing them for not playing instruments. "You don't see Boyz II Men playing instruments," he says. "We're not like Hanson - we're not a rock 'n' roll band. We're an R&B harmony vocalist group."

As one of the eldest Boys, Howie is focusing on the future: He's started a company, Sweet D Inc., which is currently developing condominiums on Florida's east coast. And he hired some of his family (which consists of mom Paula; dad Hoke; older brother John; and older sisters Pollyanna, Caroline and Angie) to run the operation.

Sweet D-eal.

Alexander James McLean, known as A.J., is technically an only child. But he considers the Boys his adopted brothers, and his mom, Denise, is the group's unofficial den mother. She monitors their schedule, deals with emergencies (like when Kevin Richardson had to have his appendix out in Germany last October) and is the liaison for the band's international fan clubs.

Denise and A.J.'s dad, Robert, got a divorce when A.J. was four years old. Then, when he was six, A.J. says, "I saw him for about two days at Christmastime. That was it. I never saw him again." Until he was 18, that is, when A.J. decided to pay his dad a surprise visit. "This guy opens the door and I'm like, 'Is there a Robert McLean home?'" says A.J., who earlier the same morning had discovered that his father lived just minutes away from his own Orlando apartment complex. "He said, 'Alex?' I was like, 'Whoa! Dad, you recognize me?' I walked in, and there's Backstreet Boys stuff everywhere! He'd been keeping up with me since the day I started!"

The most rebellious Boy, 20-year-old A.J. plays up his nonconformist image with frequent hair-color changes, a variety of tattoos and a gruff, rapstyle singing voice. But he wasn't always so tough, it seems. Laughs Howie, "The first time I met him at a talent competition he was just a little pipsqueak, a little gee." Howie and A.J. were both aspiring actors as kids, and Howie reports they were often up for the same parts because of their similar Latin looks. "He was doing this little puppet show to the Paula Abdul song 'Opposites Attract.'"

A.J.'s still an occasional puppeteer - and he still loves to be in control. In fact, although the Boys' record company executives and management aren't exactly thrilled with his bad-boy look, he keeps pushing the limits. Even today, with the smell of peroxide perfuming his newly bleached hair, he's pondering his next style statement: a pierced eyebrow. Why is A.J. so intent on challenging the powers that be? One good reason: "The fans love it."

He may not be the flashiest dancer. And of the five Boys, he probably has the fewest lead parts to sing. But behind the scenes, it is Kevin Richardson, the one the others sometimes call Freight, who keeps the speeding Backstreet train on track. A perfectionist, Kevin approaches each task - whether it's giving a pep talk to his fellow singers during the TEEN PEOPLE photo shoot or making sure a steak is barbecued just right - with take-charge manner of a CEO. "My dad was probably the one who instilled that in me," says Kevin, 26, taking a break between Walt Disney World's Grad Night shows underneath Cinderella Castle, the very place he used to suit up as Aladdin when he worked there in 1993. "He would always say - pardon my French - 'If you're gonna half-ass it, don't do it at all.'"

His father Jerald's death from colon cancer six years ago made Kevin "a lot more serious," says Brian, who's also Kevin's cousin (Brian's dad and Kevin's mom, Ann, are siblings). A Kentucky native, Kevin joined the Backstreet Boys soon after moving to Orlando. At 21, the baby of the family (his brothers are Jerald Jr., 33, and Tim, 30) suddenly found himself a big brother to his new band mates - three of whom had yet to finish high school. But Kevin's self-appointed role as the group's watchdog doesn't always sit well with the others.

"I think deep down inside he feels that his contribution to the group is to be the oldest and to make sure everything is straight. That's just the way he is," says Brian. "But here I am, gonna be twenty-four, and I really don't need Kevin telling me what to do."

"The fellas probably think I'm the hardest or the roughest or the meanest," admits Kevin, "but I'll cry at the drop of a hat sometimes."

And in public, no less. When the group played his home state for the first time, Kevin teared up upon spotting his family in the audience. He also wept during a show on their last trip to Montreal: "There was a kid in the front row, and I knew he was blind. He couldn't see us, but he was smiling. I said to A.J., 'He's blind, go and touch his hand,' and A.J. did. And I just started crying, you know? I just lost it."

Though the cutthroat music business can sometimes be unsettling for this family-oriented country boy (record execs have tried on occasion to break up the group by offering solo contracts), Kevin says fans like that one make it all worthwhile.

"We're touching people's lives and making people forget about their problems for a moment." He pauses. "That's what music's all about, I think."