In a recent interview with The New Paper, she recalled how she was once dissed on the streets of Taiwan when she started out in showbiz.
Rainie, then only 16, and had just been recruited to join the now-defunct Taiwanese girl band, 4 In Love.
She said: 'I was very unpopular when I entered the entertainment field.
'I remember once, someone walked past me and said 'Do you think you're really that pretty?'
That wasn't the only incident that stung her.
She was browsing in a bookshop in Taiwan when a stranger pointed to her and muttered: 'I don't even remember her name, she's just a nobody.'
But don't let her sweet and fragile looks fool you.
She wishes her detractors would just 'scold me to my face instead'.
When 4 In Love disbanded two years later, she found fame with the role of Qi Yue in the 2005 idol drama, Devil Beside You.
Already a household name by then, she went on to record four albums. The latest, Not Yet A Woman, was released last November.
Rainie was in town recently to promote her latest drama, ToGetHer, which is currently showing on Channel U, with co-stars Jiro Wang and George Hu.
She plays Momo, a social hermit whom is obsessed with a comic character who she believes would come into her life one day.
Jiro, 28, is a member of Taiwanese boyband Fahrenheit and American-born George, 27, is best remembered for his role as Nan Feng Lin in the 2007 idol drama, Romantic Princess.
Criticisms, Rainie says, have kept her grounded but they have also increased her self-doubt.
She said she even gets insecure over whether her friends want to go out with her.
Said Rainie: 'I always make sure I ask them way in advance if they want to spend time with me.
'My biggest fear is if I ask them on the day itself, they will reject me.'
These anxieties have even been a hindrance in her love life.
Behaving like 'one of the boys' is second nature to her. She does it in a bid to bond with the opposite sex.
'My girly side won't come out at all and I become such a tomboy. That is why my co-stars have never been interested in me,' she said.
Rainie admitted that she has had her fair share of celebrity crushes, with her all time favourite being recently-married Hong Kong actor Tony Leung.
But when she was younger, the female celebrity she adored was Japanese actress Atashi Yumi. She would even go all out to emulate Yumi's physical appearance by wearing 'braces so that I could have her smile'.
Hard but fun
She said George was the best at such scenes as he could cry on cue whereas she and Jiro would have to prepare in advance.
But there were fun moments too, like when she had to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Jiro.
She said she had to get into a 'kissing position' while Jiro practised 'spitting water out'. He ended up throwing up a mouthful of water on Rainie's face.
'I was completely all right with it,' she said. 'It was just water.' Then she added with a giggle: 'And I bet a lot of girls are envious of me now!'
This article was first published in The New Paper.
