A golden hearse bearing the casket of the singer arrives late last night at a Newark funeral home. (AP)
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Whitney has come home.
Carried in a golden hearse, the body of pop queen Whitney Houston arrived in her hometown of Newark, NJ, last night, as preparations began for a massive Friday funeral that only an arena could hold.
A private plane carrying Houston’s casket from LA — where she died in a hotel room Saturday — landed at Teterboro Airport at around 10:30 p.m.
The casket was placed in a gold-colored hearse and escorted by three police cars to the Whigham Funeral Home, which handled the services for Houston’s dad, John, in 2003.
Her mother, Cissy, was on hand to receive the casket, which had been accompanied on the plane by Houston’s cousin, singer Dionne Warwick.
Hundreds of fans camped for hours outside the mortuary waiting for Houston’s casket to arrive. Some shouted, “Whitney!” as the hearse pulled up, while others pressed their faces against the funeral home’s window. A hawker sold memorial T-shirts for $10.
Actor-director Tyler Perry supplied the private jet, TMZ.com said.
Sources said Houston’s final venue will be the 19,000-seat Prudential Center, just miles from the Newark church where she first made her musical mark.
Neighbors and childhood friends said that the international icon — who died Saturday on the eve of the Grammy Awards — always kept home in her heart and that a star-studded Newark sendoff would be fitting.
“She was a very beautiful person,” said Ernestine Davis, a childhood friend who grew up with Houston at Newark’s New Hope Baptist Church.
“She never forgot where she came from. That was the most important thing.”
Earlier in the day, officials from the LA Coroner’s Office told Houston’s family that although there was water in the singer’s lungs, it was not enough to conclude that she drowned, TMZ said.
Sources said the struggling addict may have succumbed to the powerful prescription sedatives Xanax, Valium and lorazepam, which were found in her posh, fourth-floor Beverly Hilton suite, pills that may have been mixed with alcohol.
Cops plan to grill up to nine private doctors who wrote prescriptions for the doomed star, Britain’s Daily Mail reported.
Some of the pills were allegedly dispensed from the Mickey Fine pharmacy in Beverly Hills, where Michael Jackson got his prescriptions filled.
“The authorities need to be satisfied she had these drugs in her possession legally,’’ a source told Britain’s Sun.
Another source noted, “The only way Whitney could function was on a cocktail of different drugs,’’ according to the Daily Mail.
“She needed quite a network to obtain drugs in that kind of number.”
TMZ.com photos of Houston’s room indicate that her last meal may have been a hamburger and fries washed down with beer and champagne. A room-service tray on the floor of the bathroom in which she died also held a turkey sandwich and jalapeno peppers.
The coroner’s office said it may take weeks before toxicology reports are complete and an official cause of death is determined.
Houston’s mourning fans include President Obama.
“I know that his thoughts and prayers are with her family, especially her daughter,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said, referring to 18-year-old Bobbi Kristina Brown.
Additional reporting by Erin Calabrese, Philip Messing, Kevin Sheehan, Jeane MacIntosh and Larry Celona