Remember how it all began?

Fifteen months ago, Hillary Clinton raised the curtain on her campaign for the presidency by releasing a highly polished video in which she claimed the mantle of champion of the little people, the protector of everyday Americans.

Then, on her way to Iowa, she donned dark glasses at a Chipotle in Ohio as she collected her chicken burrito bowl and iced tea, craving anonymity like some paparazzi-hectored movie star. She jumped back on Interstate 80 without so much as a wave to voters along the way from her shiny black van.

I retraced her steps back then and stopped to talk to the people she left in her dust. And found then what is so dramatically playing out at this month’s conventions: People love Hillary. People hate — and I mean really hate — Hillary.

I wonder how much — if at all — the needle has moved on the Hillary meter. Few political families have commanded the national stage as long as the Clintons have now — nearly 25 years. Minds are made up. Opinions are locked in.

Want to spoil a backyard cookout? Mention the race for the presidency, and watch the body language shift and the jaws tighten before the family peacemaker brightly asks: “How ’bout those Red Sox?’’

Part of that polarization, starkly underlined by national polling, is that people believe she is a trimmer, too cute by half, fast and easy with the truth.

Consider: A CNN poll shows that 68 percent believe she isn’t honest or trustworthy. Donald Trump, the Republican nominee who makes it up as he goes along, does better than that. And that’s saying something.

In other words, she’s got a lot of work to do this week.

I was thinking about that Monday when first lady Michelle Obama stole the show during the Democratic National Convention’s opening night. How? By being a real person. By being genuine. By speaking so clearly from her heart.

There was no fake lip-biting but raw, real emotion when she compared Clinton’s attempt to be our nation’s first woman president to her husband’s achievement as the first black president.

She was simply spellbinding when she spoke about “the story of generations of people who felt the lash of bondage, the shame of servitude, the sting of segregation, but who kept striving and hoping and doing what needed to be done so that today, I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves, and I watch my daughters, two beautiful and intelligent black young women, playing with their dogs on the White House lawn.’’

Hillary Clinton is unquestionably whip smart. She’s steeped in foreign policy in a way few candidates have ever been. She’s an indefatigable campaigner. She could teach postgraduate courses about health care and economic policy. On paper, she’s one of the most qualified candidates to ever seek the presidency.

Still, voters wonder: Is she the real deal?

Donald Trump is a bully. He’s a misogynist. He’s capable of mocking the disabled without apology or regret. He’s a dangerous racist and an accomplished liar. His jingoistic blend of politics is odious. He blithely rejects generations of bedrock American foreign policy as if it were some local zoning ordinance. To him, facts don’t matter.

But does anyone question whether he’s real? Does anyone wonder whether he gets up in the morning and consults with pollsters and handlers before he again lays out an empty plan to make America great again?

No. The Republican presidential nominee is exactly who you think he is.

Clinton is enormously lucky to be running against him.

It’s difficult to believe that most American voters want Trump sitting behind the desk in the Oval Office.

But they want someone who is genuine. Someone who is real. And real honest. That’s who’d better show up on the stage in Philadelphia Thursday to deliver the most crucial — and most critically important — speech of her life.

Thomas Farragher is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at thomas.farragher@globe.com.