Mel Buttle has spent most of her life “being embarrassed or apologising for doing embarrassing stuff”. But it hasn’t always been this way.

“I only realised how embarrassing I was when the cool girls at primary school pointed it out to me,”  remembers the comedian, who's now so prone to embarrassment that she's called her new show 'How Embarrassment'. “I suppose I didn't really care before then. I thought it was cool to ride around on my bike with my pet chicken in the basket. Now I realise that was quite weird.

“I think it was when school started, when girls with names like Natalie and Kelly would come up and say, 'oh my god, Mel Buttle, what are you doing? That is so embarrassing!' My dad would make my lunch and wrap it up in wet newspaper to keep it cool, but everyone else had nice lunch boxes with Barbie on them. That's when I started to realise I was perhaps a little bit different.”

Buttle's dad is a constant target of her comedy, but – unlike his daughter – he's not embarrassed by the attention. If anything, he revels in it.

“See, this is his problem,” Buttle laughs. “I'll tell stories on stage about him that are clearly only funny because he's an idiot, and he just laps it up. He loves the attention. Last year at my Brisbane Comedy Festival show, he got the little flyers and posters and stood out front of the door of the show and signed them for people. He was there going, 'I'm Barry! That's me, I'm the one from the show!'

“God! It's so embarrassing! He sees himself as the star. I'm like, 'dad, I'm making fun of you, I'm mocking you'. But he doesn't care.”

You might think success – her column in The Courier Mail, her segment on Triple J, her hit podcast with Patience Hodgson – would make life easier for Buttle. You'd be wrong.

“No. No, no, no, no. First of all, let me be clear: There is no success. I still have my pyjamas on right now. But no... I'm exactly the same. That's why I can't understand when people see me and they're like, 'oh, I heard you on Triple J'... I don't know why they want to talk to me. I'm like, 'guys, didn't Natalie and Kelly tell you I'm uncool?'”

Mel Buttle appears at Brisbane Comedy Festival from March 5-9.