LOS ANGELES - As Drake's star rose over the past year, he reached the point where almost any public appearance with a woman was enough to spark tabloid rumours of a relationship.

His date for Sunday's 52nd Grammy Awards will be an exception, because the 23-year-old Toronto rapper says he's bringing his mom.

"My mother is my date Sunday night, so ... I gotta have my best behaviour on," Drake told The Canadian Press on Friday after wrapping rehearsals for his Grammy performance.

"My mother will definitely give me the talk (about manners), probably tonight. And tomorrow, and Sunday."

Here, a thousand-watt grin lights his face, and that smile flashes repeatedly as he talks. And why not?

Drake is up for two awards at Sunday's show -- best rap solo performance and best rap song, both for "Best I Ever Had," his swooning summer hit that climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard charts in the United States.

He's also scheduled to perform at the show, playing his song, "Forever," with Lil Wayne and Eminem.

Though Kanye West appeared on the original version of the song, he won't be performing with the group on Sunday -- something Drake believes was West's choice, saying: "I know he's in a great creative space right now and I think that he's working on his project ... it's going to be incredible, trust me."

After rehearsing the performance for the first time Friday, Drake struggled to describe the experience.

"That was surreal man, definitely," he said. "It's like, the whole situation is amazing to me. Obviously, to be sharing a stage with Eminem, who I met for the first time today, was amazing.

"Just last year, I was up where those black seats are," he said, waving toward the uppermost rows of the Staples Center. "To be performing here this year is like, I had a lot of sleepless nights, man, as a young kid. All this proves they were well worth it. I thought about this, and it came to fruition."

And it happened quickly.

Drake self-published his first mixtape, "Room for Improvement," in 2006, when he was still a regular on "Degrassi: The Next Generation."

Over the ensuing years, he caught the attention of Lil Wayne, incited a major-label bidding war and became one of the most successful Canadian hip-hop artists of all time, all without releasing a proper album ("Thank Me Later" is due to come out sometime this year).

When his name was called during the Grammy nomination ceremony in December, he was interviewed live during the broadcast. While stunned, he made sure to namecheck his hometown.

Indeed, he says it's important to him to let people know where he came from.

"Toronto is the biggest inspiration behind my music," he said. "I do everything I do for Toronto. It's a city I really believe in.

"It's got a bunch of great people. We got a lot of undiscovered things in Toronto, man: women, nightlife, restaurants, clubs, and talent. Women, first," he adds with a smile.

"I just wanna bring the city to the forefront. I feel like every place needs an ambassador. They need somebody to show the rest of the world how magical that place can be. I think Jay (Jay-Z) does it for New York, a lot of people do it for Atlanta, Kanye did it for Chicago. A lot of rappers take it upon themselves.

"So I just really wanna be that guy for Toronto."

Meanwhile, he's acutely aware of how quickly success has come to him -- when a reporter mentions that he and Lil Wayne have been working together for a long time, Drake corrects him: "Not really, just a year. It's been a year."

He says he appreciates the position he's in, and it's reflected in his demeanour. He arrives early for his rehearsal, clad in a grey sweatshirt and track pants, greets and shakes hands with everyone in the vicinity, snaps a photo with a young fan, and even apologizes to a reporter because he worries the echinacea candy in his mouth is obscuring his speech.

"Well, you know, really, I'm new at this," he said. "I think one of the things that we all try to do is acknowledge the fact that we're young, continue to be humble, continue to show up on time, and shake every hand that we can, and take every picture that we can.

"I haven't changed. That's the guy I was ... In life, I always try to be as cordial as I can. That's what my mother taught me."