Thirdly, not just actors and actresses change their name when they start their career, musicians do too, and they often take a name that is completely made up, sometimes even for shock value. However quite a lot of them seem to like a single name, rather than two.
That brings us to our third clue card, which shows a lady who did just that, and whom we know as Cher. In fact she has changed her name many times since she thought she was christened Cherilyn Sarkisian (though that was an error, the birth certificate was entered as Cheryl, but she only found that out in 1979). In 1961 she was formally adopted by her stepfather and changed her surname to LaPiere. Then, in 1969, she married Sonny Bono .They divorced in 1975 and the same year she married another musician Gregg Allman. They were divorced in 1979, after which she legally shortened her forename to Cher, the name she had been using professionally since the 1960s, and decided to abandon any surname.
Cher is not just a musician, she has appeared on television in her own shows, on Broadway, and in movies, for which she won a Best Actress Academy Award in 1987 with her performance in "Moonstruck"
As for the other star on this sticker, "Billie" - or Leian "Billie" Paul Piper, known as the youngest female singer ever to have entered the UK Singles Chart in the number one slot, when she was just fifteen. The youngest male, because I am sure, like me, you need to know, was Little Jimmy Osmond, in December 1972. However in 2003 Billie Piper announced she was stepping away from music to become an actress, which she did with some style, even being the companion of Doctor Who when it was rebooted in 2005, with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor (and he remains my favourite, no idea why).
Top of The Pops, as a programme, started on the first of January 1964. It had already tied in with Merlin, who had issued a set of stickers with their name in 1989. However, this set was a tie in with "Top of the Pops" magazine, which was issued monthly starting in February 1995. Its claim to fame came early, after the Spice Girls released their debut single "Wannabe" in July 1996, and the magazine included a joky article which assigned a nickname to each of the girls based on their appearance, costume, and.or personalities. For some reason everyone was talking about this and the Spice Girls went so far as to adopt those nicknames - so without Top of The Pops Magazine here would never have been a Baby Spice, a Ginger Spice, a Posh Spice, a Scary Spice, or a Sporty Spice
The magazine started out as general pop news, but then began to slant more towards young, female, music lovers and to include tips on make up and quizzes.
This set had an album was really well presented , and once the stickers were in place, many of which had to be affixed at a slant, it looked just like a glossy magazine rather than pages of stickers all in rows. The photos used were often unusual, starting with those on the first page which showed selected stars reading Top of the Pops magazine, and closing with reproductions of magazine covers. The only thing I have not been able to find out yet is how many stickers made a complete set.
In 1998 Top of The Pops magazine did actually have another issue - a set of "Pop Star T-Shirt Transfers", to be ironed on the front of any t-shirt of your choice. These were square with just the pop star`s head on them, and the stars were not named