"I loved the lyric in 'Angel of Mine', and I loved how simple and poignant it was. Eternal was actually my first concert I went to – I just remember learning all these ballads of theirs. I was completely Eternal-obsessed from eight to 12! Maybe it was that they had elements of gospel in their music, and it was still in the pop scene. ""There weren’t many black women on the TV when I was growing up – there were maybe one or two, not people I could look up to and say, ‘Oh, that’s me, that’s who represents me. I have a chance of being on TV one day, and I could be a singer.’ ""When Eternal came along, my mind was blown on so many levels. I thought they were so beautiful, and they had so many hairstyles that I thought were amazing. Then, on top of that, they could truly sing ­ – they’d come from the church. Instead of always looking at American singers, they gave me a British option – something more relatable and close to home. ""Now, there’s so much [black British media] coming out – the actress Zawe Ashton has just released a book, and it was so amazing to see her take account of her [experiences]. There’ve never been any people on TV that show any products for her hair, just this dream that’s sold that you’re going to have this amazing glossy hair! I felt so touched by that chapter, ‘cause it just reminded me of myself as a kid. You forget once you’re an adult, and you get to move somewhere like London and have access to all of these things. As a kid it can feel very lonely and you feel very different. I feel very grateful for the progress we’ve made as a country, to prevent that feeling as much as possible."" ""I try my best to take on that responsibility, though thankfully I think there’s so many more people of colour on TV – including black women. The culture has so much more of a voice from when I was growing up, and I think that’s the beautiful thing about social media as well: you can see yourself in so many places, and you can choose where you look. When I’m on TV, though, I definitely think about that. I think about me as a kid, and what that would have meant to me. I’m proud of stepping out there and doing my best to represent in the best way possible. I feel very grateful to have had that opportunity. It’s so important for children’s self-esteem and sense of belonging."

"Sgt Pepper’s was my childhood Beatles record. Again, it’s moving, but in quite an abstract way, just describing what she’s leaving behind. You don’t ever hear where she’s gone or why, but you get these little hints: she’s leaving home after living alone and yet her Mum and Dad are there. It’s all done with McCartney’s jovial style but it’s got this sadness in it, which I think he’s really good at - he’s done it lots of times, with ‘Eleanor Rigby’ being the absolute epitome of it. “But that whole album made an impact on me as a kid. It’s a kind of dark, sickly-feeling album to me. It’s not very comfortable, it’s trippy and weird. You don’t really know where you are with it, it’s colourful, but in a ghoulish way. It’s a scary record for a child, because it’s just so weird. And ‘She’s Leaving Home’ holds you a bit closer than the other songs I think, even though it’s about someone leaving home. I also like the musical elements - the melody and the structure of it. “The Beatles have been an ongoing influence in my life and I think if you like them as a child you’re always going to like them. But the great thing about The Beatles is the breadth and the evolution of their records, if you’re not feeling ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’ anymore, you can dip in at different points and find different sides to them. ""There’s so many things they touched on. ‘Helter Skelter’ is basically the whole of The Who’s output in one song; the post-rock elements of ‘I Want You (She’s So Heavy)’, that’s a fucking genre now! And they just did it for a laugh and never did it again. There’s so many little flashes like that and more than anything it just makes me feel like it would have been so amazing to have been around in a time when nothing’s been done. “The other great thing about the Beatles was that they put stuff on those records specifically for children, tracks like ‘Octopus’s Garden’. I think that’s something that’s been completely lost now, because children are given adult themes in a friend way now, rather than saying, “Here’s something you might actually like, being a child. Don’t worry about the other stuff.” Although funnily enough, with Get To Heaven we got so many people telling us that their children really liked it. We were really pleased about that - maybe it’s the colourful nature of it. It’s definitely something I want to explore more."