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Model Paula Hamilton, one of the most famous faces of the 1980s, has revealed that she lost her virginity to Simon Cowell.
Miss Hamilton, 50, star of the decade’s iconic Volkswagen Golf TV commercial, says she was 16 at the time.
She says in today’s Daily Mail Weekend magazine that she lost her virginity to ‘a boy called Simon’ – the man who grew up to be the X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent Svengali whose fortune is valued at £200million.
She and Cowell were childhood sweethearts while growing up in leafy Hertfordshire in the 1970s, she said.
She also claimed that, in contrast to his Mr Nasty image on TV, he was ‘very, very protective’ and stopped teachers vilifying her.
She went on: ‘I couldn’t read or write until I was 11. So I was called stupid and bullied by teachers. Simon was really important to me because he stopped them picking on me.’
As well as being her adolescent knight in shining armour, Cowell could also be a rebel. According to Miss Hamilton – a reformed alcoholic and cocaine addict – the first time she was ever drunk was with Cowell.
‘He was funny and rebellious like me,’ she said. ‘Alcohol made the feelings inside me go away.’
Discovered by photographer David Bailey, Miss Hamilton became one of the modelling stars of the 1980s.
Her role in the 1987 VW Golf ad symbolised the growing economic independence of British women. In it, she is seen leaving a house, flinging off her pearls and her wedding ring, but keeping the keys to the car.
‘If only everything in life was as reliable as a Volkswagen,’ ran the tagline.
In the intervening years, Miss Hamilton has struggled with her addictions and a complicated personal life.
She had a brief marriage to a cameraman in 1987 as well as a disastrous affair with the billionaire former Conservative party vice-chairman Lord Ashcroft. In the 1990s she was engaged to film-maker Henry Cole.
Miss Hamilton also tells Weekend how she had an affair with cricketer Ed Giddins, who played four Test matches for England and is more than ten years her junior. The pair met while filming the new Channel 4 show Celebrity Five Go To… South Africa.
Miss Hamilton – who has been diagnosed with dyslexia and dyspraxia – said she had her first ‘grown-up’ relationship with Giddins, 39, although they are now just friends.
Cowell, 51, was engaged to singer Sinitta and had a six-year relationship with TV presenter Terri Seymour. He is engaged to make-up artist Mezhgan Hussainy, 37. His spokesman was unavailable for comment.
Now read the interview in full
Paula Hamilton was 16 when she lost her virginity to ‘a boy called Simon’. They’d known one another from the age of 12 and he was, she says, ‘very, very protective of me’. ‘I couldn’t read or write until I was 11,’ she explains. ‘So I was called stupid and bullied by teachers. Simon was really important to me because he stopped them picking on me.’
What she neglects to mention, though, is that this Simon is, in fact, Simon Cowell. Why? Well, it just hasn’t occurred to her. That first love was 34 years ago now, but Paula still lights up when she talks about Cowell. ‘He was funny and rebellious like me,’ she says. ‘The first time I got drunk was with Simon. Alcohol made the feelings inside me go away.’
Paula was the ‘face of the Eighties’ who powered through that decade on drugs, drink and outrageous behaviour, throwing away a successful modelling career as carelessly as she chucked away her pearls, fur and wedding ring (but not the car keys) in a memorable advert for a VW Golf.
Today, aged 50, she’s been sober for five years and, for the first time in her life, actually likes being in her flawless skin. So much so that she’s happy to chat openly about Cowell and any other lover I mention.
Yet Paula doesn’t get the art of conversation. In truth, she doesn’t get people at all. One moment, her bikini bottoms are around her ankles to show me she doesn’t have a single grey hair – ‘anywhere’; the next she’s juggling her surgically enhanced breasts, boasting, ‘These are cash and carry.’ In short, the Paula I meet is just as I expect: still stunningly beautiful but totally exasperating, with a mind spinning in different directions like a whirling dervish.
I expected this because, beforehand, I’ve spoken to the dyslexia assessment specialist Katherine Kindersley. Four years ago, following exhaustive tests, she diagnosed Paula as suffering from severe dyslexia and dyspraxia (an impairment that affects the ability to organise one’s thoughts). While her verbal reasoning skills place her in the top five per cent of her age group, her ability to control her language
and thinking is like a child’s.
Astonishingly, despite the many years she’s spent in therapy, her condition went undetected until the age of 47. Instead, she was said to be bipolar, stuffed full of heavy-duty antidepressants and sent on her way. Today Paula manages her condition through the techniques Ms Kindersley has taught her, combined with a healthy diet. ‘When I was diagnosed I was euphoric. I thought, “Now I understand why I’ve never felt normal.”
sourceMiss Hamilton, 50, star of the decade’s iconic Volkswagen Golf TV commercial, says she was 16 at the time.
She says in today’s Daily Mail Weekend magazine that she lost her virginity to ‘a boy called Simon’ – the man who grew up to be the X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent Svengali whose fortune is valued at £200million.
She and Cowell were childhood sweethearts while growing up in leafy Hertfordshire in the 1970s, she said.
She also claimed that, in contrast to his Mr Nasty image on TV, he was ‘very, very protective’ and stopped teachers vilifying her.
She went on: ‘I couldn’t read or write until I was 11. So I was called stupid and bullied by teachers. Simon was really important to me because he stopped them picking on me.’
As well as being her adolescent knight in shining armour, Cowell could also be a rebel. According to Miss Hamilton – a reformed alcoholic and cocaine addict – the first time she was ever drunk was with Cowell.
‘He was funny and rebellious like me,’ she said. ‘Alcohol made the feelings inside me go away.’
Discovered by photographer David Bailey, Miss Hamilton became one of the modelling stars of the 1980s.
Her role in the 1987 VW Golf ad symbolised the growing economic independence of British women. In it, she is seen leaving a house, flinging off her pearls and her wedding ring, but keeping the keys to the car.
‘If only everything in life was as reliable as a Volkswagen,’ ran the tagline.
In the intervening years, Miss Hamilton has struggled with her addictions and a complicated personal life.
She had a brief marriage to a cameraman in 1987 as well as a disastrous affair with the billionaire former Conservative party vice-chairman Lord Ashcroft. In the 1990s she was engaged to film-maker Henry Cole.
Miss Hamilton also tells Weekend how she had an affair with cricketer Ed Giddins, who played four Test matches for England and is more than ten years her junior. The pair met while filming the new Channel 4 show Celebrity Five Go To… South Africa.
Miss Hamilton – who has been diagnosed with dyslexia and dyspraxia – said she had her first ‘grown-up’ relationship with Giddins, 39, although they are now just friends.
Cowell, 51, was engaged to singer Sinitta and had a six-year relationship with TV presenter Terri Seymour. He is engaged to make-up artist Mezhgan Hussainy, 37. His spokesman was unavailable for comment.
Now read the interview in full
Paula Hamilton was 16 when she lost her virginity to ‘a boy called Simon’. They’d known one another from the age of 12 and he was, she says, ‘very, very protective of me’. ‘I couldn’t read or write until I was 11,’ she explains. ‘So I was called stupid and bullied by teachers. Simon was really important to me because he stopped them picking on me.’
What she neglects to mention, though, is that this Simon is, in fact, Simon Cowell. Why? Well, it just hasn’t occurred to her. That first love was 34 years ago now, but Paula still lights up when she talks about Cowell. ‘He was funny and rebellious like me,’ she says. ‘The first time I got drunk was with Simon. Alcohol made the feelings inside me go away.’
Paula was the ‘face of the Eighties’ who powered through that decade on drugs, drink and outrageous behaviour, throwing away a successful modelling career as carelessly as she chucked away her pearls, fur and wedding ring (but not the car keys) in a memorable advert for a VW Golf.
Today, aged 50, she’s been sober for five years and, for the first time in her life, actually likes being in her flawless skin. So much so that she’s happy to chat openly about Cowell and any other lover I mention.
Yet Paula doesn’t get the art of conversation. In truth, she doesn’t get people at all. One moment, her bikini bottoms are around her ankles to show me she doesn’t have a single grey hair – ‘anywhere’; the next she’s juggling her surgically enhanced breasts, boasting, ‘These are cash and carry.’ In short, the Paula I meet is just as I expect: still stunningly beautiful but totally exasperating, with a mind spinning in different directions like a whirling dervish.
I expected this because, beforehand, I’ve spoken to the dyslexia assessment specialist Katherine Kindersley. Four years ago, following exhaustive tests, she diagnosed Paula as suffering from severe dyslexia and dyspraxia (an impairment that affects the ability to organise one’s thoughts). While her verbal reasoning skills place her in the top five per cent of her age group, her ability to control her language
and thinking is like a child’s.
Astonishingly, despite the many years she’s spent in therapy, her condition went undetected until the age of 47. Instead, she was said to be bipolar, stuffed full of heavy-duty antidepressants and sent on her way. Today Paula manages her condition through the techniques Ms Kindersley has taught her, combined with a healthy diet. ‘When I was diagnosed I was euphoric. I thought, “Now I understand why I’ve never felt normal.”
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