Cheryl Fernandez-Versini: From girl next door to pop princess

With her glamourous jet-setting lifestyle and glittering career in music and TV, it’s easy to forget that Cheryl wasn’t always an international megastar.
We take a look back to see how the nation’s favourite Geordie lass has changed over the last 15 years or so.

Remember those heady days of 2002, when Pete Waterman could still get a primetime TV gig and Girls Aloud thought Mahiki was just a cheap version of a popular coconut-based liquor? Here’s girl-next-door Cheryl Tweedy, ready to take on the world. Hurrah!

Talent show Popstars - The Rivals eventually spawned Cheryl’s band Girls Aloud - pictured above, about to decorate Louis Walsh’s Christmas tree - and, uhm, One True Voice.
Remember them? Louis Walsh is still trying to forget.

Of course, it didn’t take Cheryl long to ditch the girl-next-door look for something more edgy. Remember that classic ‘cornrows and exposed bum cheeks’ look the whole world was sporting back in the early naughties? No, us neither.

A bit of a moment to forget for Cheryl, this one. In 2003 the aspiring star was hauled in front of a judge charged with a racist attack on a nightclub toilet attendant. She was ordered to pay her victim £500 in compensation, as well as £3,000 court costs.

At least it didn’t take long for Girls Aloud to see the error of their ways and ditch those tasteless tracksuit bottoms and G-strings for something more chic, eh? Oh, hang on. Still, at least Cheryl wasn’t lumbered with wearing that collar. Poor Nicola.

By 2006 Cheryl was a fully fledged Wag having got hitched to Ashley Cole. Quite whose idea this flabbergasting photoshoot to plug the National Lottery was, we’ve no idea. Rumour has it the jackpot plummeted to £50 that week as millions of Brits decided they’d rather stay poor than turn into this.

Football reached peak Wag during the 2006 World Cup in Germany, with lingering shots of the likes of Cheryl, Posh and Colleen Rooney accounting for around 50% of the TV coverage. Here she is sporting a hat later made famous by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.

Chezzer embraced her newfound Wagdom and became a regular at Stamford Bridge in the early days of their marriage - although you’re supposed to watching the footie, not chatting on your phone Cheryl! Tsk.

By 2009 the nation had become a little bit obsessed with poor old Cheryl’s rapidly shrinking waistline, and this snap, taken amid accusations that her marriage to Ashley was on the rocks, did little to ease her fans peace of mind.

Cheryl got a massive TV break when Simon Cowell picked her to replace Sharon Osbourne on the fifth series of The X Factor. She’d already had some practice acting as a mentor to some of the hopefuls the previous year. Here she is explaining the correct way to wear a trilby hat to Leon Jackson.

Our hero dressed up in some rather offbeat military garb to plug her debut solo single Fight For This Love. Her private life had been rocked by Ashley’s dirty shenanigans with mum-of-one Aimee Walton - but she came out fighting with her own army of backing singers.

By 2010 Cheryl was enough of a megastar to warrant her very own waxy likeness at Madame Tussaud’s. Can you tell which one is the waxwork? It’s the shiny-skinned blank-looking one, obviously! Oh…

Having been unceremoniously dumped from the US version of the X Factor amid claims the Yanks couldn’t understand a single world she was saying, Cheryl came back fighting by single-handedly bringing the beehive back into fashion. For an hour or two.

Cheryl got decked up as a kind of rave-inspired Power Ranger for her triumphant performance at Wembley Stadium. The Calvin Harris-penned hit rocketed to number one and sparked a bit of a feud with pop rival Rita Ora, who claimed she’d been offered it first and thought it was a bit too rubbish for her. How rude!

Cheryl tested the acting waters with a cameo appearance in a charity edition of Corrie, in which she headed off to a Christmas party with Weatherfield whinger Norris Cole. Viewers were less than complimentary about her acting abilities - and Steve McDonald wasn’t too impressed either, judging by this photo.

Chezzer switched her surname from Cole to the rather more cumbersome Fernandez-Versini after getting hitched to the mysterious Jean Bernard after just three months of dating. The pair divorced this week, with Cheryl claiming his “unreasonable behaviour” caused her stress and resulted in her dramatic weight loss.

The tabloids went seriously nuts when Cheryl was first snapped with One Direction’s Liam at the tail-end of last year. The more cynical among us thought it was all just a career move, but the couple are now hurtling happily towards their first anniversary. And they said it wouldn’t last.

For several months the papers have been using images like this one as absolutely irrefutable rock-solid proof that Cheryl’s got a bun in the oven. Not convinced? She’s glowing, alright? It’s good enough for us.
Congratulations, Cheryl!