Stacey: My Story So Far

by Stacey Solomon

  We waited for ages, then the door finally opened and in walked Dannii. We surged forward and surrounded her, screaming and shouting about how glad we were that she was our judge. Poor thing. We practically fell on her, and she’s so small and fragile that she probably thought she was going to die.

  ‘We’re going away. I can’t wait for you to come,’ she said, giving us one of her big smiles.

  I immediately rang my sister. ‘I got through!’ I told her.

  ‘Are you joking me? Are you joking me?’

  ‘No!’ I screamed. ‘Can you come and pick me up?’ I could have stayed one more night at the hotel if I’d wanted to, but I couldn’t wait to get home to Zach.

  It must have been about one in the morning by the time we got back but my mum was still waiting up for me. ‘Mum, I did it,’ I said.

  ‘I knew you would,’ she said. ‘Well done you.’

  I was so happy. It felt like a proper achievement to have come so far. No one really remembers who appears at boot camp, but if you get to the judges’ houses, your friends are going to be impressed and say, ‘Well done.’ So I was proud of myself. I was in the last twenty-four out of 200,000. That’s not bad going for a nineteen-year-old girl from Dagenham, I thought.

  Chapter 9

  One of my favourite possessions is a fluffy blue dolphin. I love it because it reminds me of one of the coolest weekends of my life, when I went to Dubai for the judges’ houses stage of The X Factor with Dannii Minogue. That was one wicked weekend and I’ll remember it for ever.

  It started with a phone call telling us to meet at the airport. We were all there: me, Stacey McClean, Rachel Adedeji, Despina Pilavakis, Lucie Jones and Nicole Jackson – the girls! We had no idea where we were going, and when we found out it was Dubai, I was really excited. I’d never been anywhere like that in my life and I couldn’t wait to see what it was like.

  We stayed at the Atlantis, a massive, beautiful hotel on a man-made island off the coast of Dubai. It had marble floors and ceilings and mosaics and sculptures everywhere you looked. I shared a room with Stacey McClean. On our first day, Dannii took us to Aquaventure, the coolest water park in the world. It was mind-blowing. There was a slide that dropped you down under a tank of real sharks – it was the maddest thing. To top everything, Dannii arranged for us to swim with some dolphins, which is why I bought the fluffy dolphin as a souvenir at the airport on my way home. Oh my God! I’d always dreamed of swimming with dolphins, so it was just a dream come true, magical in every way. We got to ride them, kiss and cuddle them and dance with them. It was so good.

  Dannii had given us our songs before we went to Dubai, so we’d had loads of time to practise them. I decided to sing ‘Over The Rainbow’ because I just love singing that song. First, though, it was time to find out who would be helping Dannii judge this round. We all met in the lobby of the Atlantis and were shown up to the biggest suite I’ve ever seen. The ceilings were something like 50 feet high and there was a massive front room. As we were standing there, gaping at the grandeur of it all, Dannii walked in with her sister Kylie. I opened my mouth in amazement and my heart kept skipping beats. Oh my goodness, I’m in a room with Dannii and Kylie Minogue!, I thought. It was such a good feeling.

  Before we each did our bit in front of the Minogue sisters, we waited in a bedroom with a four-poster bed and five bathrooms surrounding it. Weirdly, I wasn’t a bit nervous before I sang my song in front of Dannii and Kylie. I think it was because I was so pleased to have come this far and I wasn’t thinking about what would happen next. ‘I’m cool. I’ve come to Dubai. I’ve met Kylie Minogue. I’ve sung to Dannii and Kylie, and they are so cool.’

  But I felt completely different when it came to decision time. I was a wreck. When you’re watching it on telly, you just don’t realize how intense it is. Yeah, you think, biggest day of your life, is it? But when you’re actually there, believe me, it really does feel like the most important day of your life.

  We each had to go up in a lift to Dannii’s suite to find out whether or not we’d got through, and all the others went up before me. Once they’re up there, they don’t come back again, so I had no idea who was through and who wasn’t. Oh no, I’m last again, I thought, sitting alone, crying my eyes out. I didn’t think there was any way I could have got through, but, oh, I wanted it so badly. I’m definitely not through. Why else would I be last? Because I’m not through, I thought. I felt sick with nerves. Just tell me now, I kept thinking. Get it over with.

  Finally, I got in the lift and went all the way up. At the top, I started walking down the corridor to where Dannii was. I was trembling and crying; I just couldn’t calm myself down. It felt like the longest corridor in the world. When I got to the end, I walked through the doors into Dannii’s enormous suite. The ceiling seemed higher than ever and I felt tiny underneath it.

  Dannii was sitting on a blue velvet sofa in the middle of the room, wearing a beautiful red silk dress, her legs tucked under her. She had a really sad expression on her face and my heart plunged to the floor. Oh no. I haven’t got through, I thought.

  She called me over to the sofa and I sat down opposite her, feeling absolutely devastated. Her big blue eyes were full of sympathy for me.

  ‘It’s a really tough decision,’ she said. ‘All of you are so good.’

  Tears were pouring down my face. My eyes were leaking like someone had turned a tap on. I couldn’t control it; water just gushed out. I felt hysterical and at a really high pitch emotionally.

  ‘From the first performance, you’ve blown us away with your personality and you’ve blown us away with your voice. You have to know that.’

  It was like she was trying to console me for what was coming next. I nodded and sort of whimpered.

  ‘Getting through the three months of the competition takes such strength. It’s not just the voice. And I wouldn’t want to put anyone through the intensity of it that just didn’t have that self-belief.’

  So she didn’t think I was strong enough. She didn’t think I had enough confidence or self-belief. I went on nodding and crying. I wiped the tears from my eyes for about the hundredth time. Wait, maybe she did think I was strong enough. Maybe she was just prolonging my agony. I had no idea. My body was so tense it felt like I might snap at any moment.

  Dannii looked at me for several seconds without speaking, her eyes boring into me. She blinked very deliberately, and blinked again. I couldn’t read her expression at all, but she seemed very sad and serious. Then she opened her mouth to speak. This was it, I just knew it. I scrunched up my face in anticipation.

  ‘We love you! You’re in my final top three!’ she yelled, breaking into a grin. She reached over to hug me.

  ‘Oh, thank you, thank you so much,’ I said, smiling and crying at the same time.

  I couldn’t even hug her at first. I was thinking, Help me! Help me! I felt so weak, so happy and so shocked, I couldn’t breathe properly. I couldn’t believe I was in the final twelve. Not in a million years could I believe it. I didn’t know what to do with myself. All the tension and anxiety was seeping out of my body; I was like a balloon deflating.

  I walked back down the corridor crying and gasping for breath as Dermot said, ‘Come on.’

  I hugged and squeezed him. ‘I’m going to get my teeth whitened,’ I said joyfully when I finally found the breath to speak. I’d heard that when you get through to the live shows, you get your teeth whitened. I was thrilled, because I never could have afforded to get it done in real life.

  I was in. Who would have thought it? I kept thinking.

  The show’s presenters, Holly Willoughby and Dermot, were so nice to me. When they hugged me, they really hugged me. ‘I am so genuinely happy for you,’ Holly said. They seemed as happy for me as I was. It was just the best feeling in the world to think that people really cared about me and wanted me to do good and be successful. I’d never experienced that before. It was the nicest thing. It’s funny, but when people want me to d
o good, it makes me want to do good, even when it’s people I don’t know.

  Next, I rang my mum, on camera. She was in the car with my little brother Josh and Zach, driving back from my dad’s, when she heard her phone ringing, and she had to pull over to the side of the road to answer it.

  When she picked up the phone, I could hear Josh yelling, ‘I wanna talk to Stacey!’

  ‘Shush a minute,’ my mum said. ‘Let me listen to what she’s got to say.’ Then the phone cut out, because it was bad reception. ‘Ring me in five minutes,’ Mum said when I called her back. I’m going to have to find somewhere else to park up.’

  It was all being filmed and I had to ring her about five times in the end. Finally, I managed to tell her the good news, though. ‘I’ve got through!’

  ‘No,’ she said softly. ‘Did you really? Are you sure?’

  ‘Mum, you’re on telly,’ I said. ‘Scream or something.’

  ‘Stacey, I’m in the car with two children in the car and you want me to scream down the phone?’

  ‘Yes, I’m in the final twelve!’ I yelled.

  Finally she let out a massive scream. ‘Wow!’ She sounded so happy that I just wanted to cry all over again.

  ‘Can I speak to Zach?’ I asked. I was desperate to tell him, even though he wouldn’t understand. I wanted him to know that, more than anything, I wanted to succeed for his sake, so that I could make something of myself and give him the best upbringing I could.

  ‘Da,’ I heard him say in the background. That was his first word. ‘No.’ That was his second word.

  All of a sudden, I just couldn’t wait to get home. I was like, I need to be home now!

  We didn’t leave until the next day, though, which was tough on the girls who didn’t get through. It was hard for me, Rachel and Lucie, too, because we were each sharing a room with one of them. They were devastated, of course, so the last thing you wanted to do was show how happy you were. If it was you, you wouldn’t want someone jumping around for joy, so it was a case of being courteous until we got home. I carried on and pretended nothing had happened, because that way we didn’t have to talk about it. There was no need to remind anyone of their disappointment, that was for sure.

  When we arrived at Dubai airport and I thought back over the past few days, I shook my head in amazement. What a weekend! I’d swum with dolphins, visited the most incredible water park ever, met Kylie Minogue and made it through to the live shows of The X Factor. It doesn’t get much better than that.

  Back at home, everything went back to normal for a while, but my head was in the clouds, although I tried to keep myself down to earth. I felt so grateful for the way my life was turning around. I just couldn’t believe my luck. It was so amazing to be given the opportunity to be a finalist on the biggest TV talent show in the country. It was unbelievable.

  After my audition was shown on telly, suddenly there were photographers sitting outside the house and journalists asking me for interviews. Me and my mum were like, What’s going on? I hadn’t done anything yet. It was only my first audition. Then boot camp was shown and the attention increased even more.

  Obviously I couldn’t tell anyone I’d got through to the live shows because it was a secret, and all my family had to keep it secret, too. We were still in shock that I’d got so far and were too scared of something going wrong even to talk about it amongst ourselves. ‘Let’s just see what happens,’ we said. We were determined to stay down to earth about it. We didn’t want to get our hopes up only to have them dashed, and I wasn’t going to let any of it go to my head.

  I carried on going to college and tried to keep everything normal. My friends asked me what was happening, but I said, ‘I don’t know. I’ll find out soon.’ I just kept my head down, worked hard and passed my end-of-term exams.

  The first week I was at The X Factor house in Hampstead, north London, we were on total lockdown, because nobody was allowed to know we were the final twelve. Then it came out and everything went absolutely mental. There were hundreds of X Factor fans outside the house all day, every day, just standing there taking pictures, and people would wait outside Wembley Studios all the time as well. It became crazier as each week went by and we were given more and more exposure. Hampstead is one of the most Jewish areas in the world, so I had hundreds of people on the street, stopping me and asking, ‘Are you Jewish? Really?’ They were so excited about it.

  At first, I kept myself to myself in the house, and it took me a few weeks to start trusting anyone. I was lucky with my bedroom as I was sharing with Lucie and the girl group Kandy Rain, who were really nice girls, so when Kandy Rain were voted out and Lucie was voted out not long afterwards, I had this massive room to myself. It was the biggest room in the whole house, with a TV and a square bath in the en suite bathroom – the only en suite there was.

  On the first live show I sang ‘The Scientist’ by Coldplay. To my disbelief, I was told that Robbie Williams would be mentoring me in the run-up to the show. Yes, Robbie Williams! I had no idea what to say or do when they pushed me into the room where he was waiting for me. I didn’t know whether to smile or wave or what.

  ‘You know when you see someone on telly and they’re not like a real person? But now you’re here and you’re real. And I’m like, Oh my God!’ I gushed. He must have thought I was a right idiot, but he was really nice to me and it was amazing when we sang together. We did a duet at the piano. He was very cuddly, the total opposite of Whitney Houston, who mentored us in the second week. It’s weird to meet somebody you know you definitely can’t cuddle or get too close to or say the wrong thing in front of. With Whitney Houston, you said, ‘Hello,’ and stood on the other side of the room. I remember my nails were all chipped and I was sure she was thinking, What a tramp! She hasn’t even painted her nails!

  It was so different with Robbie. At the end, I hugged him and I didn’t want to let him go. He probably thought, Get off me, you freak! But after we’d said goodbye, he said, ‘Stacey’s great. I want one. I think every home should have one.’ I bet he’d swallow his words if that ever happened.

  Robbie was very encouraging, but he was worried about my confidence levels. ‘Do you believe that you can do it?’ he asked me.

  ‘I think so, but sometimes I get a bit scared,’ I said.

  ‘All you have to do is stand there and just give it to them on Saturday night,’ he said.

  ‘OK,’ I said, but I was dreading it.

  My clothes were chosen by Fay, our stylist, and I was really happy with them: high-waisted jeans; a Dolce & Gabbana Marilyn Monroe T-shirt that I just thought was the coolest thing in the world – and Fay let me take it home with me – and red shoes with gold studs. My hair was straightened and I had a fringe, so it was quite a different look for me. I had to pinch myself to remind myself it was me.

  I was happy to be singing ‘The Scientist’ because Coldplay are one of my favourite bands, but I was really nervous before I went on. My mouth went completely dry and I kept coughing, as if I had something stuck in my throat. Everyone’s going to be watching me, I thought, feeling completely panicked. It was a horrifying idea. I was terrified I wouldn’t be able to remember the words and I started sweating and shaking. Every single bit of me was trembling. As the seconds ticked by, leading up to the moment I walked on stage, my heart was hammering against my chest.

  All the time I kept thinking, Who am I? I’m no one. I’m just a girl from Dagenham. I don’t know anything about this industry. I was clueless. I was walking into it blind.

  I went out there and sang to the studio audience, who were wicked. Funnily enough, while I sang I wasn’t conscious of all the millions of people at home, even though I was well aware of the audience figures. People kept saying, ‘Millions of people will be watching,’ but all you see is the hundred or so in the audience, and there are so many lights on your face that you can’t really even see them. I did see my dad, though. How could I have missed him? He was wearing a T-shirt with my name on it and
waving like a maniac. I had to look away, because I was worried he’d put me off.

  Amazingly, it went well. I remembered the words, my voice didn’t shake too much and the judges were all really nice to me. I got really, really good comments. They all said, ‘It was such a good idea to choose that song. Well done.’

  That was one of the best days of the whole competition. I was buzzing and I felt so good about myself. I felt even better when Coldplay sent me a plaque, which they’d all signed. ‘To Stacey, we love watching you on telly. You’ve got a really good voice and we think you are lovely,’ it said. It was so cool.

  When I left the stage, I had that deflating feeling again, like I was a balloon losing all of its air. It was a huge sense of relief: Phew! I did it! And now I had to go through the whole thing again for the next show.

  We rehearsed every day. First, you’d find out what you were going to be singing. If you didn’t like it, you didn’t have to sing it, though.

  Next, you went into the studio and laid down a version of the song. They cut it down and edited it, then you’d start getting to know the edited version before you recorded it. After that, you’d practise it with Yvie Burnett, the singing coach, and you’d practise it for the rest of the week, with help from Yvie every couple of days.

  We did choreography with Brian Friedman. Whether you were going to be standing still, walking across the stage or doing a dance routine, Brian would take you through it every step of the way. He was fantastic. Every week you did VTs, which were three-hour interviews where you sat there for what seemed like an eternity as they asked you question after question after question.

  On Saturdays you were buzzing and on Sundays you just about kept buzzing with anticipation until the end of the results show. On Sunday night, after the announcements, you died. A part of you would completely collapse, even if you’d got through. It was the end of the week, the end of all the stress and anticipation of that live performance, and you turned into a walking zombie.