Paul Potts remembers his troubled childhood

Paul Potts can hardly believe his luck, says Rebecca Hardy in the Daily Mail. The former mobile phone salesman won ITV's Britain's Got Talent two years ago, and his life has been turned around.

Last year, he completed a sell-out 100-date world tour, and more people (74 million) have seen his rendition of Nessun Dorma than Pavarotti's. It's the kind of success that he couldn't have dreamed of when he was a child.

Growing up in Bristol, Potts was physically abused by his father and relentlessly bullied at school. It was more than name-calling: he was, he says, beaten up every single day. And he just let it happen.

"It was like at home - if I answered back, things just got worse. The way I saw it, I didn't deserve to be treated any other way than in a bad way."

His self-esteem was non-existent. "I remember when I was 12, someone shouting out, 'Paul Potts is dead', and the whole class cheering. That was very difficult. I'd think, 'Why me? Why does everyone pick on me? What have I done?

"In fact, I asked them once and they just laughed at me and said, 'It's because you're you.' That confirmed my fears. It was because of who I was." ·