Happy birthday, Taylor: calm in the face of fame

HAPPY Birthday Taylor Swift, who is 30 today. Love her or hate her (love!), you have to admit that hers is a wonderful spin on the merry-go-round of life.

Taylor was born on a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania and signed to a record company at the age of 14.

She is now a huge star, worth £270 million and with more than 123 million adoring fans who follow her Instagram account. Mainly for updates about her cats, Meredith, Olivia and Benjamin.

Taylor (pictured) is beautiful, with exquisite songwriting skills that first captured what it was to be young and silly, later developing into lyrics about heartache, breakups and the unfathomability of love. (‘Have I known you for twenty seconds or twenty years?’)

Yes, there have been lots of boys. Some of them bad. Harry Styles (who had ‘Might as well . . .’ tattooed on his waist when they were together); Scottish musician Calvin Harris and let’s not mention that weird escapade with actor Tom Hiddleston, which left his career in shreds, while hers surged ever onwards.

She stood up to her own record company and last year ended her 14-year silence about her political affiliations. I know this may come as a shock, but she came out for the Democrats. No! Yes.

Now she is appearing as Bombalurina in the new film version of Cats, complete with a furry kittenish bosom that is giving millions of us nightmares.

She even composed one of the film’s songs with Andrew Lloyd Webber, proving that no matter how successful you are, you have to keep trying new things.

As she turns 30, she will have spent more of her life being a star than not, but has remained wholesome and hardworking. Can she emerge intact from the flume of fame?

‘Do not let anything stop you from making art,’ she said recently. If anyone can stay sane, it’s her. Purrfection or cat-astrophe?