We all knew and loved Dustin Diamond as the goofy, dorky character Screech from “Saved by the Bell.”

Now Diamond is back in our lives, only this time he’s performing the role of himself, the stand-up comedian.

Diamond, now 25 – but reading at a 26-year-old level, he adds – has just moved from California, where he grew up, to Wisconsin.

The move was made to be closer to his girlfriend, manager and a lot of friends, he says.

Diamond has been on tour for six months now, and has only had a total of about three weeks at home over this time. He drives to the places he’s performing at, unless flying is the only option, because it’s both easier and cheaper, he says.

Since “Saved by the Bell,” Diamond has been inventing products, teaching chess for the U.S. Chess Federation, acting in movies, and touring with his stand-up routine and with his band, Salty the Pocketknife.

Contrary to what one Web site reported, Diamond did not get into acting by working as a live mannequin.

“The Internet gets everything wrong,” Diamond says. “I never worked as a mannequin.”

Diamond says the true story is that when he was eight years old, he and his mother were in a department store.

Diamond noticed a mannequin pole without the mannequin and began dressing up and putting on backpacks, pretending to be the mannequin. The department store manager saw Diamond, thought he was cute – “believe it or not, I used to be cute,” Diamond says – and set him and his mother up with a modeling agent.

While building his portfolio for modeling, Diamond was goofing around and cracking up the people working the shoot.

One of the staff thought he would be a good actor and set him up with an acting agent. Diamond then began getting parts on television and eventually got the role of Screech on “Saved by the Bell” at age eleven.

He graduated from high school two years early. After that, he said he bought college books and studied them thoroughly instead of enrolling in college.

“I didn’t pay anybody 40 grand,” he says. “I studied psychology, electronics, [and] programming.”

Despite Diamond’s well-known character, he said he is still able to get acting parts, regardless of being stereotyped.

“Anybody on a successful [television] run will be typecast,” Diamond says. “It’s just a matter of going out and doing things other than Screech.”

Along with being in a 98 Degrees music video, Diamond can be found in the more recent movies “Big Fat Liar,” where he plays a party guest, and “Made,” where he plays himself.

As for comedy, Diamond says he considers it to be “in his blood.”

“I’ve always been weird, I guess. I understand -” he pauses “-timing.”

Diamond says his comedy for stand-up comes mostly from real-life stories and odd occurrences that have happened in his life, which is what makes his routine so funny.

He’s been playing music his entire life, Diamond says. It was in 1994 when Diamond picked up a bass guitar he knew it was what he wanted to play.

His band’s music is currently available on mp3.com and a CD is expected to be out soon.

Diamond says he considers his career “very successful.”

“It’s a matter of getting over the next hurdle. With acting, you never know what’s going to happen. It’s different, because you never know what to expect.”

Diamond says he has always been extremely interested in chess, which is why his character on “Saved by the Bell” played chess.

“I have a lot of experience with chess,” he says. “The more you learn about yourself, the more you’ll understand chess.”

“If you look throughout history, chess has been in every civilization in our society. Napoleon and Benjamin Franklin played chess. Benjamin Franklin was the first person to write about chess in the U.S. The caesars of Rome played chess.”

Diamond could be remembered for any of his multiple careers, but he said he wouldn’t choose to be remembered for just one of them.

“[I’d like to be remembered as] an all-around family entertainer. Just kidding. [Maybe] a jack-of-all-trades. I’m a perfectionist – I want to excel in anything I have an interest in. I don’t put all my eggs in one basket. There’s a wide range of things that interest me.”

When asked to compare his preference for working on the original “Saved by the Bell” series, where Diamond played the role of Screech as a student, or in “Saved by the Bell: The New Class” series, where he played the same character as an administrative assistant to the principal, he says he doesn’t have much of a preference.

“It was the same job,” he says. “Being [part of] the majority of the cast” was probably his preference, where he was the same age as his co-stars.

When asked of the possibility of having a “Saved by the Bell” reunion, Diamond says he didn’t think it was likely.

“I don’t think so. I don’t think I would do them. I’ve explored every avenue of that character.”

Diamond says he doesn’t keep in contact with his co-stars from the television series because he doesn’t “make it down to the unemployment office very often.”

He says he keeps busy with his music and stand-up, which prevents him from seeing them.

Despite the fact that “Saved by the Bell” ended in November 1998, Diamond says he is still recognized by people on the street.

“You have to worry when [people] stop recognizing you,” he says.

When asked about the Web site www.dustindiamond.com, a site that claims to be maintained by Diamond and states that “coming this fall I will tell you all how you too can become a famous superstar and sex symbol like me,” Diamond says his lawyer is attempting to shut the site down.

“Some guys went and set that up. They try to sell it like it’s me.

“If I did something with it [after it’s shut down,] I’d probably do a professional site and point out the fact that the other one was bogus.”

Diamond adds the site isn’t done well and that he might put information about his band or his stand-up on the site.

When informed that his character Screech was in second place for the choice of who people would most likely kill of the “Saved by the Bell” characters on www.whowouldyoukill.com, Diamond questioned who was in first place.

When told that it was Elizabeth Berkley’s character Jessie, Diamond seemed perplexed that people would find his character so unlikable.