Susan Boyle faces up to her future stardom in old promotional picture

Published on Friday 1 May 2009 09:42

THE wiry mop may be a little longer and not so flecked with grey, but it is still unmistakably Susan Boyle.

The 47-year-old Britain's Got Talent star beams at the camera holding a microphone in this newly unearthed promotional picture from 2001.

It was taken ahead of her appearance in the West Lothian Showcase talent competition final at the Deans Community High School in Livingston.

The singer, from Blackburn, was presented with a certificate – along with around 15 other finalists – after performing What I Did For Love from the Broadway hit musical A Chorus Line.

Other finalists in the event organised by the West Lothian Voluntary Arts Council included ten-year-old trumpet player Brendon Musk and singer Claire Whitefield, who was 12 at the time. Guests paid 3 to enjoy the show.

Despite having her performance described as "simply beautiful" by one judge, she failed to make any lasting impact on another.

Entertainer Drew McAdam, of Polbeth, The Interrogator from Five's Trisha Goddard Show, said: "It's terrible, but I cannot remember her at all.

"She just didn't stick with me. When I saw her on the television audition, I did wonder whether she could have been in the show, but I just couldn't remember."

Journalist Stuart Farquhar, a fellow judge, praised her "simply beautiful delivery" of the song.

Susan, a devout Catholic who famously lives alone with her cat Pebbles, was a regular entrant in local talent shows for many years, as well as singing at her local pub in Blackburn, The Happy Valley Hotel.

Despite entering an annual talent contest at Fauldhouse Miners Welfare Club several times, she never won the prize money of 5000.

The then-social convener, Robert Norris, had little difficulty remembering her.

He said: "It was a very, very hard competition. I had people from across Scotland entering.

"You had to sing four or five songs and you were marked on each, so if you had a bad song, it could really knock you down. Susan never had a bad song, though.

"It was her shyness which let her down, although she always got into my finals."

He added: "When she sang Somewhere Over The Rainbow, you could have heard a pin drop.

"I was crying when I saw her on television. I couldn't say a bad word about the lass."