Paula Abdul

Paula Abdul was born in San Fernando Valley, California. When she was 8 years old, young, she started dancing lessons. Van Nuys High School was her high school. She was also the school's head cheerleader as well as the class president. After graduation in 1980, she enrolled in the Cal State-Northridge campus, majoring in TV and radio. After joining the L.A. Lakers cheerleaders, she became head cheerleader/choreographer after only a few months, eventually dropping out of college to dance and choreograph full-time. She was recruited by The Jacksons to choreograph their 1984 "Torture" video, the first in a long list of films and videos she would choreograph. She started singing with her first CD, "Forever Your Girl" which was not a huge success until her hit single "Straight Up" exploded onto the charts in December 1988 . Since then, she has been a renowned dancer ever since, aided by her stint as judge on the cult series American Idol (2002). Her father (Harry Abdul) is Sephardic Jewish and hails from Syria. Her mother is Jewish and was born in Canada. Her parents were from Canada, Syria, Brazil and Syria. This has led to many different stories about her religion and nationality in the media. The daughter of Harry Abdul (once a livestock trader in Brazil) and Lorainne Abdul (former assistant to director Billy Wilder), grew up in Hollywood, California. She's been dancing and singing since she was seven years of age, on a tour of America. She also took tap dancing lessons, which earned her the opportunity to attend a tap dancing school. In the future, she attended Cal State-Northridge College in which she majored in Broadcast radio. In that time she auditioned for Los Angeles Lakers NBA Cheerleading team. The audition led her to a spot as a cheerleader for the team. She earned fifty dollars per game during her first year of college.