I smell what HE'S cooking

It's not often that you can look back on a childhood crush with a measure of pride. As a rule, whether you were shrieking the name of the gay one from Boyzone or failing to realise that, at the age of seven, you were one of the only women in the western world short enough to date a member of 911, the men we had plastered across our prepubescent walls were of the cringey variety.

Normally these teen hearthrobs at least do us the service of fading into relative obscurity, resurfacing from time to time as a punchline, or a Celeb Big Brother contestant or as a talking head on one of those 'We love the nineties' shows. More recently, the trend for relaunching classic boybands has brought a number of us face to face with our pretty boy of choice ten years on.

For many, including the aforementioned Steven Gately groupies, the effect is not too humiliating. Groups of twentysomethings can sit happily watching Boyzone's 2008 tour with no more than occasional squeal of 'I can't believe I thought he was straight!'. The same cannot be said for the comeback of my first true love.

Peter Andre.

I LOVED Peter Andre. I saw him live. I owned a badge. And.. yeah. With hindsight, I must admit that neither at his prime nor in the Jordan years was that man attractive. But God, I wanted to be his Mysterious Girl. Yeesh.

And so, I would like to offer my heartfelt thanks to one Duane 'The Rock' Johnson, for managing to remain in the spotlight without making me feel like a total asshat for adoring him when I was twelve. If anything, he's gotten more attractive since he stopped playfighting with greasy men and devoted himself to helping cute Disney alien kids get back to Witch Mountain or whatever. The most electrifying man in sports entertainment has not let me down. I'm only a little embarrassed that I actually read his autobiography. So, thanks Duane! Keep up the good work.

Pity he's not enough to undo the Andre thing though.