Cheryl Tweedy was born on the 30th of June 1983 in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and has three brothers and a sister. A former child model she attended Walker Comprehensive.










At the age of 6, Cheryl won the childrens "World Star Of Future Modelling" competition. She also won Boots' "Bonniest Baby", Mothercare's "Happy Faces Portrait" competition, "Best Looking Girl of Newcastle", The Evening Chronicle's "Little Miss & Mister" and "Most Attractive Girl" at the Metro Centre. She also appeared in 2 British Gas adverts, 1 SCS and 1 Eldon Square christmas advert with younger brother Garry.






At the age of 16 Cheryl auditioned for the Royal Ballet Summer School in London, where she beat over 9,000 others to secure a place. She performed on Tyne Tees Television "Gimme 5" show where she was looking for sponsors to get into the Royal Ballet School.









Despite securing a place at the Royal Ballet School and getting distinctions for her dancing from the Royal Academy of Dancing, Cheryl wanted to sing. By the age of 13 Cheryl performed many gigs including Metroland, Sunderland F.C. where she sang in front of thousands. She also sang to a massive audience in Amsterdam in a 'Party In The Park.'








Cheryl was working as a waitress when she decided to audition for ITV1's "Popstars: The Rivals". The show's aim was to create both a boy band and girl band who would then battle it out for the 2002 Christmas Number 1. At her first audition, Cheryl sang S Club 7's "Have You Ever" and Pete Waterman (one of the judges) told her she had the most beautiful eyes and skin he had ever seen. Louis Walsh (another of the judges) said she reminded him of one of the Corrs. She got the thumbs up from all three judges (Geri Halliwell being the third) to go through to the next round of auditions to be held in London.




Cheryl made it all the way through the rest of the auditions into the final fifteen girls, reknowned for being "so emotional" and crying a lot of the time! Geri came to her house to tell her she had made the final ten and Cheryl was overjoyed.









The final ten girls had to sing one song live every other Saturday night (the final ten boys singing live the Saturdays the girls weren't) and the public would ring in to vote for who they wanted to stay. The first week Cheryl sang "Baby, Now That I've Found You" and survived as Lynsey Brown was voted off the show.








The second show saw Cheryl singing Shania Twain's "Still The One". This time two girls were going to be voted off. The nine girls were split into two groups and told one girl would be going from each group. In one group it was down to Cheryl or Emma Beard to be voted off and Cheryl narrowly escaped, meaning Emma left the show. Chloe Staines was voted off also.







The third live show was even worse for Cheryl than the last two. She sang "Nothing Compares To You" beautifully but on the results show she was one of the last two to be told who was safe and who was going home. By the closest result of the series, Cheryl just about scraped more votes than Aimee Kearsley, who was voted off. All the girls had become extrememly close but it was extra hard for Cheryl as Aimee was one of her best friends.







Saturday the 30th of November 2002 was the girls' final show. Cheryl sang "Right Here Waiting" and received praise from the judges yet she didn't seem very pleased with her performance. This all changed when Davina (the presenter of the show) revealed that Cheryl was the first girl to make it into the band meaning she had received the most votes from the public! Javine Hilton was shockingly voted off leaving Cheryl Tweedy, Nicola Roberts, Nadine Coyle, Kimberley Walsh and Sarah Harding in the band.





The girls decided on the name "Girls Aloud". After three weeks of constant promotion for their single "Sound Of The Underground", the girls were declared the winners of the show as they took the 2002 Christmas Number 1 spot beating the boy band "One True Voice", also formed on the show. And the rest, they say, is history...