TAYLOR SWIFT is permeating the media this week promoting her album "Red" . . . so why not test your Taylor trivia with the "10 Things You Didn't Know About Taylor Swift". A couple of them actually surprised me.

#1) She's an award-winning poet. In the fourth grade, Taylor's poem "Monster In My Closet" placed first in a national poetry contest. Here's the poem: "There's a monster in my closet and I don't know what to do / Have you ever seen him? / Has he ever pounced on you?"

#2) Taylor's dad owns 3% of her record label. He was an early investor in Big Machine Records.

#3) Taylor's brother Austin is a student at Vanderbilt University. He transferred from Notre Dame.

#4) The DIXIE CHICKS were a major influence. There are others . . . but she ranks the Chicks way up there.

#5) She wrote a novel when she was 12. It's 350 pages and it's DONE. 

#6) She's sort of blind. When she's not wearing glasses, she's wearing contact lenses.

#7)  Her first job involved tons of bugs. She knocked praying mantis pods out of trees on her family's Christmas tree farm.

#8) Taylor Swift was the first "Saturday Night Live" host to ever write their own monologue. It was song she wrote called "My Monologue Song" 

#9) The thought of a real tattoo actually terrifies her.

#10) Taylor's grandmother on her mom's side was an opera singer. Taylor's grandma Marjorie Finlay was an "accomplished opera singer" . . . and Taylor looks EXACTLY like her. I swear. (Zap2It) You can check out Taste of Country's expanded version of the list, here.