HAVERFORD, Pa. -- Her mother and her daughter at her side, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton yesterday campaigned in the Philadelphia suburbs, territory considered a key battleground in the looming Pennsylvania primary.

As the bile settled from the Democrats' hard-edged debate the previous evening, Mrs. Clinton sought to project a softer, more nurturing image than the stern figure on the debate stage.

When asked by a supporter what he should say to prospective voters while canvassing this weekend, she replied: "You know, just knock on the door and say, 'She's really nice,' or, you could say, 'She's not as bad as you think.' "

Mrs. Clinton showcased a variety of family-friendly proposals, such as tax credits for long-term medical care and a call for a joint state-federal effort to add a paid leave component to existing family and medical leave programs.

Her Democratic primary rival, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, campaigned yesterday in North Carolina before a return to Pennsylvania this morning for a cross-state swing beginning in Erie.

On the stump, Mr. Obama complained of the "gotcha" tone of the questioning at the debate ABC televised Wednesday night in Philadelphia. "I mean, ... I think we set a new record because it took us 45 minutes before we even started talking about a single issue that matters to the American people," he said.

"And I have to say, Senator Clinton looked in her element. You know, she was taking every opportunity to get a dig in there. You know, that's alright; that's her right to kind of twist the knife a little bit."

Both sides staged conference calls through the day, offering debate post-mortems and general complaints about the tactics of the opposing camp.

David Plouffe, Mr. Obama's campaign manager, faulted the moderators' choice of questions and contended that Mrs. Clinton was waging "a relentless and negative campaign."

Howard Wolfson, Mrs. Clinton's press secretary, hailed the debate as a "game-changing" event, arguing that it signaled overdue and appropriate scrutiny of Mr. Obama's record.

Later, Phil Singer, another Clinton spokesman, charged that a campaign flyer being mailed across the state by the Obama campaign distorted his candidate's position on the North American Free Trade Agreement. He argued that the mailer "exemplifies the same kind of tactics that [Mr. Obama] has so often decried."

At Haverford College yesterday, Mrs. Clinton spoke before an invited and heavily female audience of about 300, as sunlight streamed through the tall windows of Founders Hall on the sylvan campus.

Yesterday was the first time that she and her mother, Dorothy Rodham, and daughter, Chelsea Clinton, have appeared together in the Pennsylvania primary season, although her daughter has campaigned extensively on her own already.

"My mother and my grandmother have been my role models my whole life, and I can only hope to be as good a mother to my children as my mother's always been to me," Chelsea Clinton told the crowd. Mrs. Rodham looked on approvingly from the stage but did not speak during the 45-minute event.

Later, Mrs. Clinton was to appear at a rally outside the Mayfair Diner, a local landmark in a Northeast Philadelphia white working-class neighborhood and at a meeting of Jewish community leaders in Center City.

"The Pennsylvania primary falls on a very significant date for two reasons," she told the Haverford audience. "April 22 is Earth Day, and it is also Equal Pay Day."

Mrs. Clinton decried a gender wage gap under which women, on average, still receive 77 cents on the dollar compared with men. She said the imbalance was even more acute for African-American women: 68 cents on the dollar.

Taking audience questions, she dealt with topics from Hurricane Katrina to immigration and the environment.

She praised Arizona Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, for breaking ranks with GOP colleagues by joining the call for more-effective action regarding the environment, but said she would do more -- including taking a personal role in crafting a post-Kyoto accord on global warming.

Mrs. Clinton will return today to Philadelphia's bedroom suburbs for an appearance with one of her superdelegate supporters, U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, in neighboring Delaware County.

These communities ringing the city, along with the adjoining counties stretching into the Lehigh Valley, appear to be the most even battleground in Tuesday's primary. Numerous polls have shown big margins for Mrs. Clinton in Northeastern and Western Pennsylvania. Mr. Obama is expected to carry the city of Philadelphia itself. But surveys show a tight race elsewhere in the Philadelphia media market.

Mrs. Clinton got a warm reception from the Haverford crowd, almost all of whom seemed to be in her corner before she entered the room.

Sister Karen Dietrich, principal of Mount St. Joseph Academy, is a believer in Mrs. Clinton's contention that she'll be "ready on Day One." She explained, "For me, her experience and her ability to use her experience and knowledge of Washington to get things done overrides his [Obama's] message of hopefulness."

One reason Sister Dietrich wanted to see her candidate in person was that she is deeply dissatisfied with the job the news media has done in covering the race. "Not objective, ... not factual," she said.

Melissa Carn of Harrisburg, a sophomore at nearby Bryn Mawr College, who was also there to cheer the New York senator, said she liked her stands on health care, women's rights, the war in Iraq and other issues. "Everyone seems to think Obama is the only one talking about change," she said. "But if you listen, she is, too, and I think she could do more about it."