People slowly filled the two western corners of 17th Avenue and High Street in the waning light of Jan. 2. Soon, close to 75 cheered wildly as Gahanna resident Rosemarie Rossetti emerged from the U.S. Olympics torchbearer shuttle bus.

Even the Beatles never got a warmer reception.

Shuttles dropped each of the 100-plus torchbearers at the start of each segment. A wheelchair ramp, graciously acknowledged by Rossetti, kept her above the crowd.

In the street and herded slightly by Columbus motor officers, a good-sized piece of the crowd showered Rossetti with a rain of camera flashes. A string of friends and family emerged from the shadows to be recognized.

Shortly after that, the previous bearer arrived behind an Olympic-sized motorcade and Rossetti wheeled into position. The bearer used his torch to light Rossetti's, which had been placed in a special holder attached to Rossetti's wheels, and off she went.

"My spirit soared. I was elated and overjoyed," she said Thursday. "I have never seen my friends and family so excited."

Rossetti said she's been finding "bits and pieces from different people's perspective of the event."

At the reception later that night at COSI, a torchbearer that had been on Rossetti's bus told her that when she arrived at her drop-off point, the crowd began rocking the shuttle bus.

"She said, `From that point, the whole tone of the bus changed. We started cheering and clapping,"' Rossetti said.

Earlier in the day, Rossetti received a call from Ohio News Network to spend a half-hour talking on television about her experience as a torchbearer. Rossetti said she and ONN anchor John Fortney compared Olympic torches; Fortney carried the flame on its way to Atlanta in 1996.

"He said mine was a lot nicer than his," Rossetti said. Rossetti said she and Fortney also compared prices each one paid for the torches, which the Olympic committee has requested never be relighted. Rossetti said she paid $335; Fortney spent $220.

Rossetti noted that as torchbearers were getting on the shuttle earlier in the day, they told of torches selling on the Internet auction site eBay for $1,400.

"Not me, it's staying in my possession," Rossetti said.

Good thing, because Rossetti was set to leave Saturday with the torch for Reno, Nev., where she will be the keynote speaker at the American Farm Bureau's Annual convention. She and the torch also were set to lead a procession of the bureau's 50 state presidents, each carrying their respective state flag, during the opening ceremony Sunday.

Rossetti said she will speak Monday to students at Columbus Academy.