EARLIER TODAY I had coffee with Sue Crowley. She's been friendly with Paul McKenna for years, since back in the days when he was touring regional theaters, hypnotizing people into believing they were kangaroos. Before that he was a DJ-at Topshop, then Radio Caroline, and finally Capital FM radio. Back then the idea that he'd one day hook up with Richard Bandler would have seemed as likely as David Copperfield becoming business partners with L. Ron Hubbard. But, Sue said, "Paul was like a dog with a bone when he first learned of Richard. He studied him at seminars. He modeled Richard like n.o.body's ever modeled anyone before."

Modeling is a practice at the heart of NLP. This is how McKenna has described Bandler's invention of modeling: "If someone's got a skill that you want to master, you 'model' that skill so that you can learn to do what they do in a fraction of the time it took them. Say someone's a master salesperson. They'll be doing certain things with their body, and certain things with their language. So you 'model' that. Study it, break it down, work out the thinking behind it."

Sue said Paul McKenna was incredibly nervous about approaching Richard Bandler before he finally did, in 1994, to suggest they go into business together. Since then, NLP has-thanks to McKenna's skills-become bigger than ever, a vast empire that's making everyone millions.

"Paul is an unexpected protege of Richard's," Sue said. "The squeaky-clean DJ and the ... uh ..." She paused, not knowing which bits of the Richard Bandler life history to mention, in case I didn't know the full extent of the horror. "The ... uh ... h.e.l.ls Angel, up for G.o.d knows what, CIA ... But Richard Bandler is a Leonardo of our times. He is one of our living greats."

(Much later, by the way, after this story appears in the Guardian, I'll chance upon a flier advertising a Richard Bandler seminar. It'll read: "Richard Bandler is a Leonardo of our times. He is one of our living greats-The Guardian.")

Now "Purple Haze" booms through the speakers and Richard Bandler climbs onto the stage. He hushes the crowd. They sit down. I am momentarily lost in my thoughts and I remain standing.

"ARE-YOU-GOING-TO-SIT-DOWN-NOW?" hisses a voice in my ear. I jump. It is one of Paul McKenna's a.s.sistants. I hurriedly sit down.

"I marched up the Amazon," Bandler tells the audience. "I threatened gurus to get them to tell me their secrets. They're pretty cooperative when you hold them over the edge of a cliff."

There is laughter.

"There was one Indian guru," Bandler continues, "I was holding him over the edge of a cliff. I said to him, 'My hand is getting tired. You have seven seconds to tell me your secrets.' Well, he told me them fast and in perfect English!"

I have to say that had I been tried for murder, I would be less forthcoming with the murder gags. Practically every one of Richard Bandler's jokes is murder- or at least violent-crime related. I hope-when I finally get to meet him-to ask him about the murder trial, although I'm nervous at the prospect of this.

Suddenly, we hear a loud noise from somewhere outside.

"A ghost," Bandler says. "I do have ghosts that follow me around. And they're angry ghosts. But I don't care. The truth is, the ghosts are more afraid of me than I am of them."

He is mesmerizing. Two hours pa.s.s in a flash. He talks about childhood trauma. He puts on a whiny voice: "When I was five I wanted a pony ... my parents told me I was ugly ... 'Shut the f.u.c.k up!'"

He gets the audience to chant it: "Shut the f.u.c.k up! Shut the f.u.c.k up! Shut the f.u.c.k up!" If you hear voices in your head, he says, tell the voices to shut the f.u.c.k up. "If you suffered childhood abuse, don't go back and relive it in your mind. Once is enough!"

He says psychotherapy is nonsense and a racket: Therapists are rewarded for failure. The longer a problem lasts, the more the therapist is paid. Who cares about the roots of the trauma?

"Don't think about bad things!" Bandler says. "There's a machine inside your brain that gets rid of s.h.i.t that doesn't need to be there. Use it! I can give myself amnesia. I can just forget." He clicks his fingers. "Just like that."

This seven-day training course is costing delegates 1,500 each. Which means Paul McKenna's company will rake in almost a million pounds for this one week's work. The tea and biscuits may be free but we have to buy our own lunch. For all the hero-worship of McKenna and Bandler, there's still a lot of grumbling about this, especially because whenever we traipse out into the rain to try and find somewhere to eat in this c.r.a.ppy part of town, we're compelled to traipse past Paul McKenna's immaculate chauffeur-driven silver Bentley, number plate 75PM, parked up in the ugly forecourt, waiting to swish Richard Bandler off somewhere unimaginably fancier.

IT IS LUNCHTIME NOW. I walk past the Bentley. A delegate sidles up to me. "You're a very naughty boy!" she says. "Richard will be very cross with you!"

"What?" I practically yell.

"You kept writing when Richard was talking even though you know you weren't supposed to!" she says. "And you didn't have a smile on your face. Everyone was laughing, but you were scowling."

I missed yesterday's session, which is perhaps why everyone is so far ahead of me in the frenzied-adoration stakes. In fact, earlier today Richard Bandler said he had no unhappy clients. His exact words were "The reason why all my clients are a success is that I killed all the ones who weren't."

Lots of delegates have told me they signed up because of the TV star Paul McKenna but the great revelation has been the man they hadn't heard of: Richard Bandler.

THREE OF PAUL MCKENNA'S NLP-inspired self-help books (Change Your Life in 7 Days, Instant Confidence-which is dedicated to Bandler-and I Can Make You Thin) are currently in the WHSmith Top 10. So that's the therapy side. The NLP-can-do-wonders-for-your-business side is thriving too. In fact when I meet Iain Aitken, the managing director of McKenna's company, he says the phobic delegates are becoming the minority now that NLP has become so widespread in the business world. I ask Iain what is it about NLP that attracts the salespeople. Bandler, he replies, teaches that everyone has a dominant way of perceiving the world through seeing, hearing, or feeling. If a customer says, "I see what you mean," that makes them a visual person. The NLP-trained salesperson will spot the clue and establish rapport by mirroring the language.

"I get the picture," the NLP-trained salesperson can reply, rather than "That rings a bell" or "That feels good to me."

AFTER LUNCH, we split into small groups to practice NLP techniques on one another. I pair up with Vish, who runs a property company in the Midlands.

"What did I miss yesterday?" I ask him.

"It was great," he says. "We did anchoring. Let me show you how it works."

Vish moves his chair closer to mine.

"How are you enjoying your time here?" he asks me.

"OK," I say.

Vish pokes my elbow.

"Brilliant!" he says. "Did you have a good lunch?"

"It was all right," I say.

Vish prods my elbow again.

"Fantastic!" he says. "Have you got kids?"

"A son," I say.

"Did you have fun with him last weekend?" he asks.

"Yes, I did," I say.

Vish pokes my elbow.

"Brilliant!" he says. "Now. Did you notice what I was doing?"

"You were poking my elbow every time I expressed positive feeling," I say.

"Exactly!" says Vish, although he looks peeved that I spotted the poking, which is supposed to be so subtle as to exist only on the unconscious level.

"Now," says Vish. "When I want to sell you something, I'll touch your elbow and you'll a.s.sociate that touch with a good feeling, and you'll want to buy. That's deep psychology." Vish pauses. "What I really like about NLP is how it can hypnotize and manipulate people. But in a good way."

I STAND UP to stretch my legs and I spot Paul McKenna at the front, near the stage. Even though I'm still supposed to be doing the small-group workshop, I decide to introduce myself. I take a few steps toward McKenna. Instantly, one of his a.s.sistants swoops down on me. There are about forty a.s.sistants in all, scattered around the room.