Girls Aloud songstress Kimberly Walsh has revealed that she was almost cast in Coronation Street as a certain iconic character, a couple of years before her big break in the girl band.
The singer from Yorkshire rose to fame when she was selected to be a member of Girls Aloud in the 2002 series of Popstars: The Rivals alongside Cheryl Tweedy, Nadine Coyle, Nicola Roberts and Sarah Harding.
However, Kimberly's career almost took a very different route and she revealed how she almost broke through into the world of soaps shortly before she made it big in the iconic girl group. Of course, her sister Amy Walsh is in Emmerdale!
Speaking to Alex Jones and Gethin Jones on BBC's The One Show last night, the mother-of-two explained that she made it down to the final stages of casting for Coronation Street's Maria Connor.
MORE: Emmerdale star Amy Walsh on why Tracy will keep her shock baby
"I got down to the last two or three for Maria in Coronation Street, so yeah, things could have been very different," she said during an interview about her newest theatre role in the on-stage take on the 1993 Tom Hanks classic, Sleepless in Seattle.
As Corrie fans will know, long-time cobbles character Maria has been played by soap star Samia Longchambon since she first appeared over two decades ago in May 2000.
Meanwhile, it seems that Kimberly's rejection from soap land was meant to be as she and her Girls Aloud ladies went on to rock the world with two number one albums and win five BRIT awards before they parted ways in 2012.
Since her Girls Aloud days, Kimberly has become a household name in her own right thanks to her stint on the 2012 series of Strictly Come Dancing, in which she was partnered with Pasha Kovalev.
Kimberly and Pasha made it to the final and were crowned the runner up pair, being pipped to the post for the winner's spot by olympic gymnast Louis Smith.
Coronation Street continues on ITV.
