HGF and melanoma: The skin of these mice has melanocytes in the dermis, epidermis, and dermal–epidermal junction, and thus this model is more akin to human skinAged HGF/SF‐transgenic mice develop sporadic melanoma with metastasisCutaneous melanomas arise in UV‐irradiated HGF/SF‐transgenic mice in distinct stages that resemble human disease, including grossly identifiable premalignant lesions, intermediate radial and vertical growth stages of heterogeneous histopathologies, and late metastatic spread to a variety of distant organs