Biography
Originating from Bradford in West Yorkshire, British performer Kimberly Walsh first gained notice as a cast member of the all-girl pop ensemble Girls Aloud. As a youngster she pursued acting ambitions, taking part in multiple stage musicals and a handful of advertising campaigns during her teenage years. Between 1997 and 2000 she portrayed Sally McDonald on the British soap opera Emmerdale. In 2002 Walsh successfully auditioned for the ITV series Popstars: The Rivals, where she was grouped with Nadine Coyle, Sarah Harding, Nicola Roberts, and Cheryl Cole; together they formed Girls Aloud and ultimately claimed victory in the competition. The quintet went on to issue a string of commercially dominant albums: Sound of the Underground in 2003, What Will the Neighbours Say? in 2004, Chemistry in 2005, Tangled Up in 2007, and Out of Control in 2008. Outside her Girls Aloud commitments, Walsh has hosted multiple television programs, among them The X Factor. From October 2011 through May 2012 she appeared as Princess Fiona in the West End mounting of Shrek: The Musical, and later that same year she competed on the BBC series Strictly Come Dancing. In 2013 she issued her first solo project, Centre Stage, a collection of Broadway show tunes.