Determine if XMLNode exists or is empty?

programming flash
1

What would be the best way to determine if an XMLList contains a specific node and if that node contains any text or contains a specific attribute?
This is probably a stupid question, but I think i’m doing it all wrong…

if(myXML.nodeName) { return true; } // returns true even if it contains no content
if(myXML.@attributeName) { return true; } // returns true even if the attribute is empty or doesent exist

For example how would you determine the following:

  <items>
  <item></item> // does item contain text?
  <item val="1">cheesecake</item>  // does item containt attribute val1?
 </items>

 <items> // does node "items" contain an "item"?
 </items>