TO HER father, she is Princess; to her mother, she is "meine kleine puppe" (my little doll) or, simply, Britty.

Hundreds of Britt Lapthorne's happy snaps posted on the internet have revealed to the world an image of a typical young backpacker: keen to meet new friends, party and learn about foreign cultures.

But as her mother, Elke, enters the third week of an agonising wait for news from Croatia about her missing daughter, she is comforted by memories of a girl who "has everything to live for".

The last time Mrs Lapthorne heard Britt's voice was September 15, three days before her daughter went missing in Dubrovnik, on Croatia's coast.

Britt had called to wish her father Dale a happy birthday, just two months after spending her own 21st with her parents in Paris.

Mrs Lapthorne said her daughter's favourite pastime was being with family: "She loved nothing better than coming home after work or uni and putting on her old dressing gown and slippers and she'd sit on the couch with me."

When travelling recently, mother and daughter slept in the same bed. Early on Monday morning, broken after hearing that an unidentified body had been found in the sea off Dubrovnik, Mrs Lapthorne shared a bed with her sister Barbara, the pair holding hands.

The family now awaits the results of an autopsy, although Croatian authorities say it is unlikely the remains are Britt's.

Meanwhile, the owner of the hostel where Britt stayed before she went missing has denied claims she had tried to post an Australian passport the day after the backpacker went missing. Milka Perkovic's children yesterday said in a statement she had, in fact, successfully posted the forgotten passport of another guest.