Myleene Klass addresses ‘longest engagement in history’ with fiancé of 5 years Simon Motson – exclusive

Inside a glamorous West End restaurant, Myleene Klass is full of effervescent energy and charming everyone in her presence.

She greets all the team on this exclusive HELLO! shoot at Brasserie Zédel in  Piccadilly with a hug and a wide smile before effortlessly and elegantly posing for the photographer. At one point the classically trained musician, who studied at the Royal Academy of Music, even takes to the piano to showcase her impeccable talent, to the delight of the staff setting up tables for lunch.

Later, she doesn’t hesitate when asked to lie on the floor so that sheet music can be strewn around her. It’s her willingness to try her hand which has endeared her so much to the public, who have long embraced her as a musician, pop singer, television and radio star and, of course, queen of the jungle. 

And, as she marks 20 years as a presenter on Classic FM with this shoot and interview, Myleene tells HELLO! how, at the age of 47, she feels completely at ease with herself. 

“I feel more confident than I ever have,” she says. “It definitely comes with age; I know who I am – and I like who I am.”

Personal life 

The mother of three is engaged to Simon Motson, her partner of 11 years. “I don’t know what the longest engagement in the history of the world is, but this could be it. We’ve all been dragging our heels with it, haven’t we?” she laughs as she plays with the beautiful 7.6 carat black diamond engagement ring on her left hand. 

When asked when the wedding might be, she replies: “Hero [her 14-year-old daughter] will be really happy you asked that, because she’s always asking me the same thing.”

Will it be this year? “Maybe, I don’t know. I think it’s probably because I get the opportunity to dress up all the time and have these lovely concerts and things – so maybe it would have to be a ceremony with a bit of a difference.”

Myleene has come a long way since she first emerged into the public consciousness in 2001 as a budding singer in the reality TV show Popstars. Now she is celebrated not just for her showbusiness work but also for her campaigning for women suffering from miscarriages. 

Her fight for research into miscarriages and for changes in the way in which women are treated has seen her regularly campaign with MPs. She was awarded an MBE last year for her efforts. 

She is also a mentor at her former secondary school in Great Yarmouth and is passionate about the need for music lessons in mainstream education. Not bad for a woman who thought she would have only 15 minutes of fame when she joined Hear’Say in 2001. 

“I thought I was going to be famous for three months over Christmas in Hear’Say,” she laughs. “That’s what they promised me. But I move and I welcome change. I get bored very easily and like to look for new opportunities. When they present themselves, I grab them. 

“I look at the trailblazers out there – people like Twiggy [76-year-old Dame Lesley Lawson], who I’m proud enough to call a friend – and I just think, ‘Keep on blazing that trail for us’.”

She cites the Sixties supermodel as the person who showed her that she could be a successful working mother, having met her on a shoot when her eldest daughter, Ava, now 18, was a baby.

“She took Ava out of my arms when I had to walk on to set and said, ‘She’ll be fine with me’. And when I came back, Twiggy had wrapped a towel around her and was mashing up mango and she said to me, ‘She’ll just be a dressing room baby, like my baby.’ That’s when I thought, ‘I can do this’.”

Since then, Myleene has presented on TV shows including BBC’s The One Show and the Classical BRITs, recorded albums, written books, collaborated with Freemans and created her own bikini range. And, of course, she (with her white bikini) was runner-up on the 2006 series of I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!. She went on to win the all-star South Africa spin-off in 2023.

Throughout it all, Classic FM has been a constant. Myleene says she “loves” working there. 

“I’ve lived so much of my life through those hallowed halls,” she says of the station, where she currently presents two shows a week. “I’ve been pregnant in those halls. My children have come in and sat in their studios. 

It’s just been a real linchpin to much of my work. It was not cool growing up to be a mixed-race girl in Norfolk who loved books and her classical music, but then this station came along and I had found my own community. To be one of the voices there is incredible.”

Playing the harp for King Charles 

A particular highlight from her time there was when she played the harp during a live broadcast in 2017 in front of Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall, as they were then.

“I was utterly terrified. I couldn’t test the room for sound and a string had already gone just before we went live on air. But [the King] said he enjoyed it and has had me back since.”

The King also welcomed her to Windsor Castle last July when she was presented with her MBE for services to women’s health, miscarriage awareness and to charity. While there, she told him what she was campaigning for.

 “I said that at the moment in the UK, you had to have had three consecutive miscarriages before there’s medical intervention. I said: ‘Surely, Your Highness, you wouldn’t expect to have three consecutive heart attacks before any kind of medical intervention?’ And he agreed.”

Myleene brought along Simon and her three children – Ava, Hero and six-year-old Apollo – to the ceremony, which was especially poignant as she has suffered four miscarriages. “I felt so proud, and then, obviously, to have my little rainbow baby [Apollo] standing there by my side was so special, even though all he wanted was snacks. We hadn’t even made it out of the door before he asked!”

Myleene Klass is on Classic FM every Saturday 4pm–7pm

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