Free Daring to Dream by Sam Bailey Page B

manager and also does musical theatre, and Andrew is an absolutely wonderful guy who’s still singing now and does a lot of great charity work. The four dancers were called Hayley, Shirley, Carla and Nicola and we all bonded really quickly. We used to rehearse all day and then go down the local pub and do karaoke in the evenings. We were a bit of a powerhouse whenwe walked through the door and no one else got much of a chance to get on the mic when we were around.
    All of the crew I worked with came along to the
The X Factor
tour and we had a big reunion, which was brilliant but surreal. Some of us hadn’t seen each other for 14 years and now we’re all married and we’ve got kids. I still think of myself as that young girl in some ways, and I think it’s a real eye opener when you see old friends all grown up and settled down. I think I still expected some of them to look like they were in their early twenties, as if they’d been stuck in a time warp.
    While I was in Wakefield I got the results of my medical, including the outcome of my smear test. I will never, ever forget looking down at the letter and seeing the words ‘severe cancer cells’ written down and then ‘abnormal cells’ written in the first line. Nowadays the word cancer isn’t used – doctors say ‘mild, moderate or severe changes’ instead – and you can imagine my reaction. I was petrified. No one in my family had ever had cancer, so it wasn’t something I was familiar with. But of course I’d heard enough stories to know that the disease can be fatal and it frightened the living shit out of me.
    I went straight to a doctor who explained everything to me and said I would need the bad cells removed from my cervix. The waiting list for the procedure was three months and I had to be on the ship in two months’ time, so I ended up paying almost £500 to get it done privately at QueenMary’s Hospital in Sidcup. In the end, I had it the day I was leaving for my first ever cruise, which was far from ideal. I was in hospital in the morning and in the afternoon I had to fly out to the dry dock in Malaga. I was in a lot of pain but the excitement of what lay ahead helped to take my mind off of it.

CHAPTER 5
COME SAIL AWAY
    A s soon as I arrived in Malaga in March 1999 it was go go go. We had to go through all of the choreography again and I was still in agony from the procedure. I was bleeding a lot and the pain lasted for a couple of weeks. I don’t think dancing around was the best thing I could have done, but thank goodness for that medical because if I hadn’t had that test done I would never have known I had a problem.
    We were all so excited about finally getting on to the ship and I couldn’t wait to see where I was going to be living for the next few months. When we boarded, everything was covered in plastic and it smelled so fresh and new. I had a suitcase full of glamorous dresses that I’d borrowed from anyone and everyone to get me through the first few weeks. During the day we wore a Thompson T-shirt and shorts, but we had to look smart in the evenings, especially whenwe attended things like the Captain’s Dinner. I don’t do dresses so I had to beg, borrow and steal enough outfits to tide me over until I could afford to top up my wardrobe. I was a tomboy who struggled to put make-up on, so to suddenly have to wear floor-length gowns, glitzy jewellery and have my hair in a chignon felt so alien. I was so shoddy with everything; I didn’t have a clue! All I wanted was to go on stage and sing for people but the whole look was a massive part of it. It wasn’t even like my make-up could be subtle. I had to wear white and black eye shadow, bright red lipstick and false eyelashes. I felt like a clown.
    A lot of people found themselves feeling really ill for the first few days on the ship, just because they weren’t used to bobbing up and down. It’s easy to underestimate how sick and disoriented it can make you feel if you