M y father used to tape Top of the Pops for me every Sunday and I would sit in my bedroom, write down the lyrics of all of my favourite songs and sing along. I was always singing in my bedroom with a hairbrush. After I came second in a talent competition, I got the bug and wanted to be a singer. I was in a couple of bands, then a talent scout came down to Swansea and thought I had an interesting voice, so I went to London, made some demos, then didn't hear anything. After two years, someone called me out of the blue and told me I'd got a record deal on the same label as Elvis!

It's no good singing if you just want to be a pop star, you've got to work at it and do it for the love for it, not because you think it will make you famous. I never did that, I never thought about that. I advise wannabe singers to form a band, practise in your garage if you have to, but do as many charity or open mic shows as possible to get experience. I sang for seven years before getting a record deal and I was already loving what I was doing. I just got lucky and got discovered.

I had my first hit record in 1976, then all of a sudden, I had all these nodules on my vocal cords - I thought my career was over. They got quite big so I had to have an operation to remove them. You're not supposed to talk for six weeks after the operation but I found it very difficult because I'm a bit of a chatterbox. I tried not speaking, but when you can't speak, you can't go out. After you've had a hit record, if you go out and don't talk to anyone, people are going to be like, "Oh my God, who does she think she is?" They would have thought I had a big head. One day I just screamed out of frustration, then went back to the specialist and he said I had done damage to my voice and it would take six months for me to recover. Any singers who have lost their voice should listen to the doctor and be quiet! After you recover, you should practise as much as possible. Singing uses your muscles, so you have to train every day. It was such an inconvenience.

But after I got my voice back, I went into the studio for the first time and started singing. The band said, "Woah, your voice sounds great." My voice was huskier than before, and had more of an edge. It turned out losing my voice was not too treacherous for me - I had my first hit in America with my new husky voice on It's a Heartache. Three other girls had recorded the song before me and it didn't go anywhere in America, so maybe my husky voice was what that song, and my career, needed.

When I do a TV show, I hear all these artists in their dressing rooms doing scales - I've never done it because I've never had voice training. What I do to prepare is get in my car and sing along to the radio for about 20 minutes. I get nervous just before I go on stage, but the more you sing, the easier it gets. The adrenaline rush kicks in after just a few bars of a song, but the lyrics help keep me calm and find the emotion I need, especially the lyrics of Total Eclipse of the Heart. When I first heard it, I couldn't believe it had been given to me to record. I just cried at the intense emotion of it and was so happy to have that song. Now when I go on stage and sing Total Eclipse, everybody sings with me. So many people say they fell in love to it and it means a hell of a lot to them. It's such an anthem, and such a wonderful feeling, I never get tired of singing it.