When Dua Lipa took to the stage five years ago to perform her hit single 'One Kiss', she had no clue that moments later she would become a viral sensation:
You've definitely seen it at least a few times - you might have even recreated it after one too many tequila shots - but it seems the 26-year-old's meme debut felt far from a laughing matter to the woman herself.
The 2017 video showing one particular dance move - later dubbed the pencil sharpener - was instantly splashed across social media, and has continued to re-emerge since, with many finding it hilarious... although others have branded it 'odd' and 'lazy'.
Advert
Now, the 'Levitating' singer has opened up about how the trolling affected her, and how at one point she had to take herself off Twitter after things got too much.
“There was this one little dance routine that I did when I was performing, and people took that one little snippet and decided to base my whole stage presence and who I was as a performer on stage on it,” she told NPR.
"I think at that point, there were moments of self-doubt, even though it was kind of unfair because a lot of the people that had sent in those messages or were saying things online actually hadn’t been to a show.
“I was at a point where I was so happy, I was doing everything that I wanted to, but then there were people who made me feel like maybe I wasn’t good enough or I didn’t deserve to be there, I wasn’t cut out to be a musician.
“Of course it got to me.”
The star went on to explain that stepping away from social media was a way to help her mental health in the wake of the influx of hate.
"But if that’s going to help me and my mental health and allow me to thrive in whatever way I choose to, that has been a saving grace,” she recalled.
Eventually, while writing her second studio album Future Nostalgia, the singer said she was able to get to a place of being able to 'shut people out'.
“I realised that what anyone says doesn’t actually matter,” she said, “It was something that I learned during the period of writing Future Nostalgia."
She added: “Now, if anybody says anything, it doesn’t even bother me.
"Nothing even cuts through, because I realised that if you’re passionate about something and you’re good at your job and you write from the heart, no one can take that away from you."
Chloe Rowland