At 15 years old, Billie Piper became the youngest ever artist to have a number one hit with the song Because you want to. But the star says being thrown into the limelight wasn't easy.

In an interview with Fault magazine, the 32-year-old singer turned actress said that finding fame at an early age led to her spending days locked in her flat and feeling 'suffocated'.

"When you’re a pop star you’re always on duty," she said. "You’re suddenly a role model even though you don’t start out with ambitions of being a role model and also you’re a fallible mess yourself. So trying to keep some resemblance of togetherness and good behavior was just shit as a teenager."

The Penny Dreadful star added that she hated not being able to "walk around normally".

"Mostly that you couldn’t walk anywhere without people wanting pictures and autographs and I found that so suffocating. We all did at that time. I went out with Rich from (boy band) Five and we used to just sit in our flat for days, if we weren’t working, and never leave. It made you really reclusive. That’s the stuff I hated."

'Suffocated and reclusive' Billie Piper talks the realities of finding fame at a young age