NEW YORK (AP) -- Oprah Winfrey says she's not a lesbian, not even a little bit.

Her long personal and professional connection with Gayle King has sparked rumors that they are gay, but Winfrey denies it in an upcoming interview with ABC's Barbara Walters.

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``I'm not even kind of a lesbian,'' Winfrey says.

Persistent gossip to the contrary annoys her, she says, explaining that, if it were true, ``Why would you want to hide it? That is not the way I run my life.''

Asked to describe her relationship with King, Winfrey calls her ``the mother I never had, the sister everybody would want. She is the friend that everybody deserves.'' Winfrey's eyes moisten and her voice chokes as she adds, ``I don't know a better person.''

Winfrey will end her daytime talk show next spring and, on Jan. 1, is launching a cable channel, the Oprah Winfrey Network.

That new venture has given her moments of panic.

``I would wake up in the middle of the night literally like clutching my chest, like, 'What have I done?''' she tells Walters.

``A Barbara Walters Special: Oprah, The Next Chapter'' will air Thursday at 9 p.m. Eastern.

ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co.

(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)