When we love the stars light up, the wrong becomes undone. Naturally, my soul surrenders.

It seems women are expected to be so much more than men, which means we have to work that much harder. We're the ones under the microscope. We're expected to sound perfect. We're expected to look perfect all the time. We're expected to be style-setters, whereas the boys roll onto the stage in their jeans, T-shirts and baseball caps.

To me, getting to do music and videos, you work on a character. Being onstage is acting; you get to be larger than life and larger than yourself.

There's a lot of things that are said on the American Idol message board. I quit reading them because most of the people are very mean.

I'm about the only person in my family that's made it to 24 without being married. That's the way it works where I'm from. Most people, if you find someone to marry in high school, you do that, and if you don't find that, then you find someone in college.

When I was in seventh grade, I totally had a crush on a guy who was older than me, and he listened to alternative music. So he was into Days of the New and stuff like that, and more poppy stuff, too, like Matchbox Twenty.

Everything's completely different, and it's been hard. Fortunately, I have a lot of wonderful people around me, and I think I'm handling things pretty well.