BOYLE, SUSANSusan Boyle attended Edinburgh Acting School and took singing lessons from a voice coach. Prior to her appearance on Britain's Got Talent, her main experience had come from singing in her local Catholic church, in local choirs, and in karaoke performances at pubs around her village. After she won several local singing competitions, her mother urged her to enter Britain's Got Talent and take the risk of singing in front of an audience larger than her parish church. Her performance on the show was the first time she had sung in public since her mother died.
Susan Boyle was born in Blackburn, West Lothian, Scotland, on April 1, 1961. She became a household name as she burst into stardom when she auditioned for a television show, Britain's Got Talent, in 2009. Boyle is the youngest of 10 children, including four brothers and five sisters. Her father was a miner and a veteran of World War II, and her mother was a shorthand typist, both immigrants from Ireland. Boyle was born when her mother was 47 years old, and during her difficult birth, she was briefly deprived of oxygen and suffered mild brain damage; later, she was diagnosed with learning difficulties. As both a child and an adult, Boyle was bullied for her learning disabilities as well as her appearance. The neighborhood children around her childhood home in Blackburn gave her the nickname “Susie Simple.”