I always see colors when I listen to music. It's difficult to explain, but when I hear the music I think about gold, blood rushing.

When I first started, I wasn't really aware of anything in the industry or aware of who I really was. I just put my music out there and tried to get as many people to hear it as possible.

I started writing my own things when I was about 8. I used to try to bully my friends into imitating the Spice Girls on the playground. Then I realized, Oh god, my career's going nowhere, so I looked in the Yellow Pages and phoned up the first cheap studio that I found and started recording.

I see music in colours. I love music that's black, pink, purple or red - but I hate music that's green, yellow or brown.

I can't stand to hear my own voice. If one of my songs comes on in a café, I'll run out right away and come back with the police.

When I was younger, definitely getting people to listen to me and believe in me. I think it's hard when you're a young girl in a record label full of male urban artists, which is definitely what Atlantic Records was and still is. Also, getting people to trust a young, female pop star that doesn't just want to be puppeteered was definitely a challenge for me.

I used to hate swimming at school so much that I would always sneak downstairs in the middle of the night and take my swimming costume out of my gym bag and hide it in the house somewhere. Then I'd never have to go swimming at school. This went on for months and I never got caught and my Mum turned into a nervous wreck because the thought she was losing her memory... and then one day she caught me and got super angry. That was kind of bad.