Posted by Dusty

Exactly, she is a reincarnation, not a clone. She has past lives, but she doesn't inherit their life, if that makes sense... or else there'd be no reason to relearn the elements and so on.

However, when an Avatar enters the avatar state they DO possess all the past knowledge/lives of all the past avatars; however if they die in that state then the avatar cycle is broken(because all the past lives are currently part of the Avatar).