POP star Kevin Simm is preparing for a date with some of the world's top concert halls -- five years after making his singing debut in a school hall!

The 20-year-old, who is widely tipped to top the charts next week with the so-called Flopstars group Liberty, believes that had it not been for his appearance at Leyland St Mary's High School in 1996, he would never have made it.

And today his old music teacher revealed she spotted his star potential after he sang the Elton John classic Daniel in a summer concert.

Five years on, Kevin and his pop friends are just five days away from the release of their debut single -- which record company bosses are banking on going all the way to the top.

Liberty are the five runners-up of the ITV Popstars programme who didn't make it into the group which became known as Hear'say.

Kevin, who is now due to perform on everything from Top of the Tops to MTV, said: " I performed in a school production and the response I got from the audience was just magic.

"I will never forget that feeling.

"That was when I knew I wanted to be a singer. Anyway, I wasn't dedicated enough for football. I drink too much."

St Mary's music teacher Helen Dean said: "He didn't really get the stage bug until he was about to leave school.

"I took part in the summer concert when he was in Year 11 and if remember rightly, he sang Elton John's song Daniel.

"I had coached him and it was obvious he had a talent.

"He carried on performing after he left school and came back to do a couple of masses here.

"We were all routing for him when he appeared on Popstars. He has been back several times and spent most of his time here signing autographs.

"But I haven't heard the song yet."

Kevin, whose parents used to run the Royal Oak pub in Abbey Village, near Blackburn, and now live in Leyland, said: "It has been a real rollercoaster ride since then.

"We couldn't do anything until after the Popstars programme was aired so I came back up to Lancashire and started going around the pub circuit again.

"Then GMTV got in contact with all of the runners-up and asked us to go on the show when Popstars ended. We had some pizzas and a beer and started making music.

"It sounded really good and we went on the telly and decided we could make a go of it ourselves.

"We went round loads of record companies but we didn't want to be puppets, we wanted to write our own music.

"A lot of labels were put off by that. But V2 told us to go away and write it and come back to them, which we did."

The group were officially signed-up during the summer by V2 boss Richard Branson.

They have received some support from unusual quarters. Master DJs The Dreem Team ended up backing their R'n'B sound after they received a copy of the track, produced by Pete Devereux of the Artful Dodger.

The CD didn't say who the artists were, but even when they found out, they continued to plug it on Radio 1.

Kevin said: "Although we will always be linked with Popstars, we wanted people to like the music which is why the single was sent out without our name on it.

"I think our music surprises a lot of people, it is not what they expected."