LOUISA Johnson has clearly come a long way from humble beginnings in Chafford Hundred having walked through every round of the X Factor so far.

This week, her mum Lisa Hawkyard spoke to the Gazette, and told how she used to cry that she would “never be as good as Beyonce” and decided she wanted to be a singer after seeing Leona Lewis on the X Factor.

Louisa, 17, is the bookies favourite to win this year’s competition, and last weekend wowed TV audiences across the country with a spellbinding version of James Bay’s Let It Go.

From singing lessons at seven with vocal coach Katie Watts, Lisa, 46, said: “She’s never wanted to be anything else. Right from when she was a baby, she’s always been singing.

“When she was 18 months old, I took her to her first singing group. Then when she was three, Murder on the Dancefloor by Janis Ellis Baxtor was her favourite song. She used to fling herself round the house, striking strange poses.”

“But when she was eight, she saw her first X Factor and that was it.

“After seeing Leona Lewis singing ‘I Will Always Love You’, she said, right, I’m going to do that.

“She would sit and cry and get really upset, saying I want to be like Beyonce. She would be upset as even so young, she couldn’t see how she could do it.”

But as a positive mind set coach, Lisa said she made it her business to help her clients get to the top.

She said: “I said to Louisa, don’t cry – if you really want it, you can do it. You can do it if you see it in your mind.

“Now it’s amazing. The first time I saw her on TV I cried so much – I just feel very, very, very proud. She’s so young and she just gets on the stage and performs like that.

“Then when I heard she was the favourite to win I was amazed. I wasn’t surprised but I was absolutely over the moon. To me she’s amazing, she’s my daughter.”