Inside Sinitta and Simon Cowell's 20-year romance - abortion to 'revenge' marriage

I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here! South Africa star Sinitta has famously been entangled with Britain's Got Talent creator and pop impressario Simon Cowell for decades. They first met in a London nightclub in the early 1980s when Sinitta, whose mother is soul star Miguel Brown, was a teenager. He signed her to his record label in 1983, and she enjoyed chart success with hits such as So Macho and Toy Boy. Behind the scenes, the pair had a tumultuous 20-year on-and-off romance.

She has previously described their situationship as "never really over" until he welcomed his son Eric with partner Lauren Silverman in 2014. Their bond is such that she is Godmother to the now 12-year-old. Simon is also Godfather to her adopted children Magdalena and Zac, whom she and ex-husband Andy Wilner welcomed in 2007.

Indeed, Sinitta has confessed their 2002 wedding was a "revenge move," to prove a point rather than true love, suggesting it was aimed at Simon.

In 2013, she also revealed that the pair almost became parents together. She revealed she had an abortion in the 1980s while they were dating and said they were both heartbroken but dealt with it together.

The star would later struggle to become a mother following a series of heartbreaking miscarriages. In an interview with the Mirror, she described it as one of the most difficult moments in her life." Oh, it was hard to breathe. I wanted to curl up in a ball and shut the world out - so perhaps it's only natural those thoughts come back to haunt you, later," she said.

"The day I adopted my kids, I had a reason to live. It's not the British way to talk about things. When people asked how I was, I'd say, 'Oh, I'm fine.'

"You're too scared to say, well, as a matter of fact, I've just lost a child - in case people are horrified. Nowadays, it's different because people are prepared to discuss mental health," she said.

As for her relationship with Simon, after decades of back and forth, they are well and truly just friends now, and she admitted that staying friends with his partner, Lauren Silverman, helped her find the closure she needed.

Lauren and Sinitta were friends before she got together with Simon, but Sinitta holds no grudge. "It was kind of on and off, on and off, so there was kind of an unspoken understanding that was obviously a misunderstanding on my part, but it's ok," Sinitta said to MailOnline.

"I was trying to make that relationship. His narrative was just be patient, and you'll have everything you want," she confessed on the Suddenly Single podcast. "I assumed everything I wanted meant a normal family life with him. And then he met the love of his life and had a child. Silly me," she said.