A GWENT mother fears her missing teenage daughter has run away with someone she met in an Internet chatroom.

Fifteen-year-old Tammy Leanne Lane (pictured) has been missing from her Nantyglo home since Wednesday.

She was last seen early that morning having told a friend she was going to stay with a relative in Birmingham.

But her worried mother Michelle French, 33, said Tammy has no relatives in Birmingham, and fears she may have gone to stay with someone she met online.

"She has run away quite frequently, but only for one night," said Mrs French, of Waunheulog, Winchestown, Nantyglo.

"This time she took a bag full of clothes and left early while I was in bed. She's never done that before.

"I thought she had gone to school but when she didn't come home I phoned the school and they told me she had been truanting for three months.

"I thought, 'give her some time and she would come home', but we haven't seen or heard from her since."

Tammy's boyfriend of two years, sixteen-year-old Peter Clarke, has also not heard from her.

He told Tammy's mother that recently she has been using the Internet in the local library to talk to people on chatrooms, using the name 'Kimberley'.

She had made friends with one particular person online using the name 'Dawn'.

Michelle said: "I don't like how these kids can have access to chatrooms in libraries. It should be monitored. I don't know who she could have met. "Although Tammy is a very bright girl and grown-up for her age, she's still only fifteen. There are psychos out there and she wouldn't stand a chance."

Gwent police have launched an appeal for information on Tammy's whereabouts. A spokeswoman said it is possible she is with someone she met online, but that is just one line of inquiry they are following up.

Tammy is 5ft7ins, of stocky build, with blue eyes and shoulder-length blonde hair.

Her mother Michelle, with her father Andrew Lane, 42, and her brothers David, 13, Stephen, 11, Leon, 9, James, 8, Kevin, 7, and sister Kirsty, ten, have issued an emotional appeal for Tammy to get in contact.

Michelle said: "If she doesn't want to come home that's fine, but we just want her to call to tell us she's OK."

Anyone with information should call Gwent police in Ebbw Vale on 01495 350999.