Amy Winehouse: Five Facts You May Not Have Known
Amy Winehouse paid for a friend to go to rehab, wanted to be a waitress.
July 27, 2011 — -- intro: Much has been made of Amy Winehouse's struggles with addiction since her death four days ago. Her soulful voice has been memorialized, her Grammy awards listed, her relationships analyzed, her demons rattled off.
Still, there remain poignant parts of Winehouse's life that haven't gotten much attention. (Did you know what she initially wanted to be when she grew up? Or why she got expelled from school?) Even her last moments may come as a surprise.
"Knowing she wasn't depressed, knowing she passed away happy -- it makes us all feel better," the singer's dad, Mitch Winehouse, said in a statement to media outlets Tuesday. He added that at the time of her death, Winehouse was "the happiest she's been for years."
Click through to see five more facts about Winehouse:
quicklist: 1title: She loved Carole King.text: Winehouse's favorite song was Carole King's "So Far Away." Friends and family sang the folk-rock classic at Winehouse's funeral Tuesday. Among her other self-proclaimed influences: Jazz giants Thelonious Monk, Charlie Mingus and Miles Davis; hip-hop greats Mos Def and Busta Rhymes. media: 14164722
quicklist: 2title: She paid for a friend to go to rehab.text: While Winehouse famously sang about her refusal to seek real treatment for her drug and alcohol dependency, she reportedly spent more than $200,000 to send her stylist and friend, Alex Foden, to rehab. media: 14164322
quicklist: 3title: She wanted to be a roller-skating waitress.text: In a 2007 interview with Rolling Stone, Winehouse revealed her childhood dream: To be a waitress on roller-skates like the ones she'd seen in "American Graffiti." media: 14156089
quicklist: 4title: She was expelled from school for piercing her nose.text: Winehouse was booted out of Westminster, London's Sylvia Young Theatre School for getting her nose pierced and "general slackeritude," according to Rolling Stone. She dropped out of school altogether at 14. media: 14153512
quicklist: 5title: She didn't consider herself a style icon.text: Despite the scores of fans who mimicked Winehouse's swaths of black eyeliner and her 2010 collaboration with the Fred Perry label, the singer minimized her influence on fashion. Harper's Bazaar asked if she thought of herself as a style icon in a 2010 interview. Winehouse shot back, "No, of course not!" and added, "I don't think that's true. I just dress like ... I'm an old Jewish black man. I just dress like it's still the '50s."media: 14152874
