The ex-Atomic Kitten singer is more famous for problems in her private life than she is as a performer

Birth name Kerry Jayne Elizabeth Katona

Date of birth 6 September 1980

Star sign Virgo

Birthplace Warrington, Cheshire, UK

Height 5ft 3in

Eye colour Brown

Marriages Brian McFadden, 5 January 2002 (divorced January 2007); Mark Croft, 14 February 2007

Children Molly Marie McFadden, born 31 August 2001; Lilly-Sue McFadden, born 3 February 2003; Heidi Elizabeth Croft, born 20 February 2007; Maxwell Mark Croft, born 11 April 2008

Biography
Former pop princess and reality star Kerry Katona is never far from the gossip columns, thanks to her turbulent personal life.

Born in Warrington, Kerry spent part of her childhood in foster care because of her mother’s struggles with depression and alcoholism.

She gained fame as one third of girl group Atomic Kitten, but left in 2001 when she fell pregnant. Despite the band’s limited UK success, Kerry later admitted to never singing on any of the songs.

In 2002 she married Westlife star Brian McFadden (who changed the spelling of his name from Bryan to Brian when he went solo in 2004), and the couple had two daughters – Molly in 2001 and Lilly-Sue in 2003. Her triumph on the 2004 series of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! marked the pinnacle of her popularity, but after splitting with Brian later that year she began a downward spiral of depression, drug abuse and rehab.

Kerry married taxi driver Mark Croft in February 2007, just a week before giving birth to their first child, Heidi. In July, she was admitted to The Priory clinic for bipolar disorder, days after the family was taken hostage by armed robbers at their £1.5 million home in Wilmslow, Cheshire.

Despite the trauma of this incident, Kerry received little public sympathy. She has been criticised for smoking while pregnant – a habit that led her to be dubbed second worst celebrity mother in 2007 – and maligned for her appearances in TV ads for supermarket Iceland.

But she continues to satisfy the tabloids, most recently for her MTV fly-on-the-wall reality show, Crazy In Love, her legal dispute with Brian over custody of their daughters and the arrival of her fourth child, Maxwell Mark, in April 2008.

Quotes

‘I was voted the eighth most minging person in Britain. That hurts.’ (New!)

‘I got fucked up off my head on coke when Brian left me. The only way I could get help was by going to rehab, and that’s what I did.’ (GMTV)

‘I’m dead happy. I’m happier than Larry, whoever Larry is.’ (Mirror.co.uk, 24 October 2007)

‘I spend a lot of my life in back of cars – oops! I didn’t mean that in the way it sounded. Like hence the two kids.’ (Thinkexist.com)

‘Victoria Beckham is doing my head in because she seems to get a new best friend every week. One minute it’s Cheryl Cole, then it’s Katie Holmes, then J-Lo and now it’s Kate Beckinsale. I think people who flit from one friendship to another on a daily basis have issues.’ (Kerry’s OK! Diary)