Bea Arthur is nearly home. Just another mile as she winds her BMW along a rural path, while horseback riders enjoy California's sun-streaked countryside.

Before pulling into her expansive ranch-style house, a freckled-face youngster catches her eye. The boy, resembling a Rockwell painting of a halcyonic era, is off to the side of the road bathing his Irish Setter.

"Isn't that nice?" the actress says, instantly falling in love with the boy and his dog. Rolling down the window she yells out, "Hello there!" He looks up momentarily, smiles sweetly, and continues grooming the animal.

Whoever this school boy is, he and his dog may be the only ones failing to recognize Beatrice Arthur, one of television's hottest actresses. While recently nominated for an Emmy in The Golden Girls, TV Guide voted the series the best new comedy of the 1985-86 season. (The show nabbed the No. 7 slot in the year-end ratings tying with Dynasty.)

Media activity has not been this intense for Arthur, since those wild Norman Lear days of Maude. From 1972-78 the entertainer was showered with world-wide recognition, and in 1977, a long-deserved Emmy.

Nearly a decade later, the bold crusading Maude is gone. In her place is "golden girl" Dorothy, a retired, but never retiring, schoolteacher whose logic, keen-edged wit, and lovingness keep their household together.

But unlike the TV character who responds to recognition and flattery, the real Bea Arthur shies--no, runs away from the world of Q and A, Johnny Carson and especially those one-of-my-favorite recipe shows.

It's not that Arthur minds these vapid-type programs: She loathes them, and one shouldn't get her going. "Please, I regard acting as an art form. If I didn't I'd be on every five minutes doing Merv Griffin. Look, the formula's easy. There are actors, there are performers, and there are talk show people. You might say someone like Zsa Zsa Gabor is the exact opposite of me.

"Interviews? I resent having my brains picked. What do you want to know about me? (Voice rises) That I have a sister living in Canada, two beautiful sons in New York, whom I miss deeply? (Matt, age 25, is an actor; Danny, 21, is a set designer).

"I love to cook Chinese food like cucumber and Szechuan cabbage with pork. Will that do it? Or do you have to know that I drive my own car to work? (Shakes her head) That's what I read somewhere about Johnny Carson. Who gives a sh--?

(Taps on tape recorder and yells full blast) "Honestly, I cannot understand why you would want to speak with me. I've been interviewed to death, and I'm afraid of overkill."

Success obviously hasn't spoiled New York City's Bernice Frankel, raised in Cambridge, Maryland, and graduate of Philadelphia's Franklin Institute of Sciences and Art. Along the way, she worked as a medical technician at the University of Maryland, but chucked the x-rays for the White Way.

After landing the memorable part of Lucy Brown ("a real sexpot") in The Threepenny Opera, Bernice became Bea (her late mother's nickname), and waited for that big break. It came in 1966 when she won the Tony Award for her role as Vera Charles in Mame.

Rue McClanahan, who's played opposite her friend in both Maude and Golden Girls, claims her television buddy "takes success in stride, because she knows that fame is ephemeral: it comes and goes quickly."

Arthur couldn't agree more, citing that she has to pinch herself when awakening every morning. "Hey, wait a minute. I have a hit show, money, and a beautiful home. Wait another minute. I've had two hit shows in a lifetime (a third, Amanda's, fizzled), so it's sure nice knowing that what you're doing is worthy. Sometimes it pays to be a perfectionist."

It also helps that her acting technique looks deceptively simple. Arthur chalks that up to being "an exposed nerve". Someone who cannot conceal emotions. "I feel everything and I cry. I hear about injustice and cannot merely editorialize. Everything hits me--no matter what. Even looking at my dogs, I cry."

The telephone rings repeatedly as the performer, off in a daze, admires the blue skies. When she speaks, her voice is neither strident like Maude's, nor authoritative like Dorothy's. At times her tone can be so soft that you strain to listen.

"You shouldn't confuse Bea with those two women," cautions McClanahan, who should know after being friends with the star for 15 years. "Bea's low-key, easy--anything but boring. In fact, she's so unpretentious that she arrives on the set without any make-up, and quite often barefooted.

"During lunch break she never wants to be approached by outsiders; she's very private. That hasn't changed. What has is a more relaxed attitude than in Maude when she carried the show and was nearly flawless. God, such control. (At the time, Arthur was also going through a painful divorce from Broadway director Gene Saks.) With this new series, she's calmer, for now Bea doesn't have to be perfect. We're all sharing the responsibilities."

Both actresses give credit for the program's amazing popularity to the team of young writers, "many of whom are not even old enough to get married," Arthur adds. "But if you want to know why Rue, Betty, Estelle and I click, it's the chemistry between us. We're like Garson and Gable. What was that saying? 'Gable's back and Garson's got him.' Well, we've got one another."

The other thing the women have in common is genuine appeal to all audiences. Arthur, at age 60, goes crazy when she hears herself regarded as a sex symbol. "I've never been known as just another pretty face, but I did get a kick out of someone calling me 'America's Sweetheart'. (Bursts into laughter) Well, why the hell not?

"Then one day you wake up and you're not the 20-year-old kid who's trying to get a break. I remember when I was a standby for Tallulah Bankhead. She was 'Madam'. Suddenly, I'm Madam. Maybe it's my age and respect in the theatrical community that's given me this revered position.

"It's a little sad. You've no more the hope of discovery. You're there. And you're receiving young people who look to you as an idol."

The actress, unflaggingly modest, has had enough of this talk, hops back into her car, and heads for a local restaurant.

"Mimi Sheraton recommended this place a few years ago. I thought it was spectacular. What's more, I never had to leave my neighborhood."

Someone in the room whispers the name "Maude", and the comedienne launches into another anecdote. "I received a lot of hate mail for that one script on abortion, and I never wanted to go out then. I was afraid that people would want to talk to me. Especially women whose marriages had broken up. I became the instant champion to all the minorities.

"The women's movement thought of me as their Joan of Arc, when the truth is that I've never been a political activist. It takes me forever to decide for whom to vote. And the only thing I'm militant about is animal rights as you can see.

"Still, the fans assume I'm the Rock of Gibraltar. If you want to know the truth, I'm the most vulnerable 5' 9½" person you'll meet. I'm jelly especially when I've read something negative from a critic."

Anything but dismissive, the performer wishes that harsh words wouldn't hurt. "But they do. Let's be honest. At first, oh God, I was devastated. (She barely can say the word without fighting tears.) I figured 'Okay, I'm leaving the business. I'll teach them.' Then I thought, 'Forget 'em."

The waiter cordially greets the star and the actress settles in with a glass of white wine. Rummaging through the list of entrees, she calls the man over. "Excuse me, but why do you keep changing the menu?" This is going to be a long afternoon.

After ordering fish (lunch has become her main meal of the day), she talks about a six-week vacation to the Far East. "Now I couldn't believe it. Why do people adore me so?" She stops and laughs at herself. "Seriously, there I was in Bangkok when I received repeated calls from the press. Then at the Singapore airport, a man stopped to tell me that our show was No. 1 in Hong Kong.

"But the really funny thing is reading my fan mail. It's so loving and funny, except for the one episode we did revolving around a midget. A woman wrote in obviously missing the entire point. Well, I saw red. I never have done this, but I was so incensed that I phoned her. I just let her have it. Of course, she ended up telling me how ours is her favorite show. Probably to this day, she doesn't believe I called."

Any friend of Arthur's will tell you that she has a terrific sense of humor, until asked to describe herself in fuller terms.

"Anyway, what's glamorous about my life? I don't even go out, not that I wouldn't like to. Actually, I did meet this terribly attractive man on a plane en route to Canada. That what the first time in a million years that my hormones started working. But I cancelled out of the whole thing. Nothing to do with morality. Just a question of Herpes of AIDS. You never know."

Trouble ahead. The fish is bland and she calls over the waiter. "This is rather tasteless. Have you lost your chef? This reminds me of a place I took some friends to in New York after the Tony Awards. I can't describe the food (wrinkles nose), but when I got home, I wrote the president of the company to apprise him (don't you love that word?) of what happened.

"Unfortunately, I heard that this was the very same place where Gina Lollabrigida broke her tooth, and Yul Brynner sued for food poisoning. I was seething. Anyhow, my guess is that if Brynner really got sick right there, he didn't die of lung cancer!

"So I wanted to have my $129 refunded, plus a letter of apology sent to my dinner guests (address enclosed). I haven't heard from him."

The waiter scuttles back with a queasy look that she doesn't catch. "I see you have Brie cheese. Wonderful. I'd like some." He looks worried.

"What is it?" she asks. "This place sure has changed. It used to be the best. Forgive me, I'm not usually like this. I don't like to make a scene. I hope I haven't ruined your day.

"I'm usually sensitive. God knows, if you look at me cross-eyed, I will weep. Of course, say something amusing, and I'll fall apart with laughter. I have no facade. I've always been this way."

You wouldn't believe the scene as now two waiters approach the table. When they inform her that they are all out of Brie cheese, she says under her breath, "Heads will roll!"

"Only goat cheese is available," they explain.

"But it says here that you have a Brie omelet." Sounding like a scene from Five Easy Pieces, it's almost as if she can have the Brie, if she takes the omelet.

"Come on. How can that be?" she responds, trying to hold her temper.

"Excuse me Miss Arthur. Please tell us what's upsetting you. It is the food?"

Her reaction? One of those drop dead twice looks.

So it's back to the Brie. "How can you only have goat cheese?"

"Sorry," says the head waiter. "Wait a minute, I'm not certain but I think we also have mozzarella."

Her reaction? Don't ask.