Talk Is All Business At Tea With Queen

NELL MERLINO invited the queen over for tea yesterday -- QUEEN RANIA of Jordan -- and they talked about loans to women who own businesses. Nobody said anything about the little etiquette problem.

Ms. Merlino is a founder of Count-Me-In.org, which lends money to women in smallish chunks ($500 -- $10,000) and is based in her duplex apartment in Chelsea. "I was standing in the kitchen because I had catered the thing," her sister, Kate, said, "and the queen walked in and said, `Hello, I'm Rania.' She asked for a cranberry juice, which luckily, we had."

Eventually, Nell Merlino and the queen sat down to talk about their loan programs. Nell Merlino said that the queen described a lending program she had started in southern Jordan. Other guests, including KAY KOPLOVITZ, the cable-television executive, and MARIANNE SPRAGGINS, the investment banker, joined the discussion.

"The reason we started Count-Me-In.org, and the reason she's doing what she's doing in Jordan are very similar," Nell Merlino said. "We have a micro-lending program that's online. She's interested in expanding the reach."

Later, Nell Merlino gasped -- she said that she had addressed the queen incorrectly. "I think I called her `Your Highness,'" she said. "It's really `Your Majesty.'"