Jean Martyn, who reached the final of ITV's Britain's Got Talent in 2011, has opened a hotel and named it after herself.
Jean, then 60, played an organ with her own name on it, in a bright pink jacket, making it to the final but missing out on the winning spot to Jai McDowall.
Now 71, Jean is a Blackpool hotelier and runs The Blackpool Jean Martyn Hotel on King Edward Avenue.
Before her BGT journey, she had been a teacher and taught music to both primary and secondary school children in Staffordshire.
While on the Britain's Got Talent Tour of the UK – which consisted of 14 shows in just 12 days – her mum sadly passed away, Lancs Live reported.
"I'd gone home to see her on one of our days off, and I think she was already moving on to Heaven," she said, "I didn't know what to do."
Jean's dad told her she had achieved exactly what they had wanted her to, and assured her to return to the tour.
"I kissed her goodbye and went back, the night we played Wembley, she had sadly passed away."
Jean knew her mum, after paying for all her piano lessons, would have wanted her on the stage in front of the Wembley crowd.
"Simon told me to tell the audience what had happened, so I told them she had passed away, and it just fell silent.
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"Then suddenly, there was this huge round of applause – and I thought, she'll be laughing about that now," she said.
Jean was widowed before the pandemic after her husband, Bob, passed away and she said she found herself miserable, with no desire to perform.
One day in protest of 'wallowing in it', she picked herself up – a decision that would lead her not only to her partner, Hans, but also to Blackpool.
Jean met Hans during the pandemic while playing the Organ in Holland. Jean said: "I saw him across the room and he smiled at me and I smiled back at him."
Ever since, the pair have been together and 'knew' they wanted to live by the sea. With so many happy memories associated with Blackpool, like playing in The Blackpool Tower, Jean began a house search in the resort, instead finding a hotel.
"I was due to view a property in the afternoon and it had sold that morning, then my friend turned to me and said, why don't you run a hotel?" Jean admitted.
The now Jean Martyn Blackpool Hotel was once the King Edward Hotel, which Jean took over and refurbished from August last year.
Since opening, Jean's hotel has a five-star rating on TripAdvisor.
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