Helen Adams on life after Big Brother
BRIAN Dowling might have got Big Brother's £70,000 prize but Helen Adams proved to be the real winner of the reality game show. The Welsh hairdresser made the nation laugh with her "Helen-isms" such as 'I like blinking, I do' and 'Is there chicken in chickpeas?'
But it was her romance with fellow contestant Paul Clarke that had viewers of the reality game show hooked. Adams had left her boyfriend Gavin 'Big G' Cox on the outside but things soon became complicated by her burgeoning feelings for Clarke. Eventually after much soul-searching she finally got together with her fellow housemate.
Since Big Brother the 23-year-old has become a media star. In the week after her departure from the house she was on the cover of 'The Sun' and the 'News Of The World'.
Although she scooped a rumoured £200,000 for her exclusive interview, Adams is troubled by the massive exposure she received. "Perhaps we won't talk about that, that was a bit weird," she says. Then she pauses. "No. That was weird."
She's become wary of journalists after seeing her life and feelings exposed in the tabloids. She only relaxes when she starts talking about her new workout video. Sat in trademark sparkly jeans covered in shiny stars, she talks happily about 'Dance Workout With Helen', which was born from her love of dancing.
"I used to teach dancing in Wales and I still try to when I go back," says Adams, in the baby voice which we grew to love (or hate) on Big Brother. "I'm going back soon for the dancing Christmas party. It's great that is, I can't miss that. We'll be dancing the night away."
The workout video is Helen's attempt to inject a bit of fun into exercise, having a bit of a laugh while you get fit.
"I didn't have a script. Do you think I could dance and have a script?" she giggles. "It was just Helen chatting. I'm not that clever."
There's a surprise appearance at the end of the video by a member of the first Big Brother household - you'll have to buy it to find out who, yet she reveals she has actually met a number of her Big Brother predecessors when she appeared on Children In Need.
"We did a dance routine for Children In Need and I met Darren, Claire, Craig and some others," she says. Adams says she likes all her old housemates but has found it difficult to keep in touch. She speaks to Brian every now and again on the phone but it's mainly Amma she keeps in touch with. And of course Clarke.
The most famous Big Brother couple are now, after living with Paul's parents for months, moving into a flat in London together.
"Living with Paul's parents was great. It was like 'The Waltons'," she grins. "We'd all have dinner together and it was good for my mum to know I was in a nice family atmosphere. I'm looking forward to moving into the flat though."
Life since 'Big Brother' has been a whirlwind of interviews and cameras for Adams but she seems quite settled in her new celebrity lifestyle, although she is adamant she doesn't feel famous.
"I don't class myself as a celebrity, I just class myself as a Welsh girl who's been on 'Big Brother'," she says. "I just lived in a house for nine weeks with 10 people and was just myself, that was it."
Adams can't deny that, months after Big Brother finished, she is still one of the most recognisable people in the country, even if it's just for her voice. Her agent tells a story about the two of them talking in the toilets of a club when someone in a cubicle suddenly exclaimed "Oh my God, it's Helen from Big Brother.
"People see my blonde hair and then I start to talk and they recognise me," she says. "I get people coming up to me asking me to talk to their friend on their mobile and I say 'Hello' but then you don't know what else to say as you don't even know who they are.
Adams went on Big Brother "for the experience, to have some fun and a bit of a rest really" and she doesn't regret it. While it wasn't always easy for her, she would quite happily go through it again.
"I probably would do it again as I could do with a good sleep until three in the afternoon," she laughs. "I'd pick the people I went in with though, and I'd have my mum in to cook for me.
"I'd do it all again if you could just walk out and go back home with no hype.
"It was scary, coming out. You see all those people and you're thinking Why are all those people there?" Her tabloid experiences have made Adams glad she didn't nab the £70,000 prize in the end.
"Nobody ever believes me when I say this but I'm glad I didn't win," she says.
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