parts of speech - What kind of sentence constituent is "a little"?

Tell me a little about yourself.

I have got two explanations of "a little":

1. "a little" functions as a pronoun. It means "something" or "a few things"


2. "a little" serves as an adverb of degree, which modifies the verb "tell". It means that you don't have to tell me all about yourself, just tell me partly about yourself.

I don't know which one is correct.