X Factor hopeful Lauren Platt has confessed Scary Spice Mel B was the judge who made her the most nervous.

The 16-year-old from Essex impressed at the arena auditions with her rendition of Whitney Houston's How Will I Know with the former Spice Girl telling her "I'm so excited right now I could slap you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

Lauren confessed: "I really actually wanted to impress Mel, obviously I wanted to impress all of them and I know everybody always says Simon, that's just a given.

"But I really wanted to impress Mel, I'm not really sure why, I think 'cause she's Scary Spice. And she's really honest on the show, and she was last year when she was a gust judge. So I think there've been quite a few people that have been a bit nervous about what Mel was going to say to them."

The Billericay schoolgirl - who wowed in the very first episode of the ITV show with her performance of Queen Latifah's I Know Where I Have Been from the musical Hairspray at the judges auditions - admitted singing in front of the arena audience had been daunting.

Lauren said: "When I went on to the stage at Wembley Arena, I felt like a little girl. I literally felt like the smallest person in the world. But when the judges were talking and were being really nice I got bigger and bigger."

And she admitted the wait for the judges to deliver their verdict had also been tough.

"When the judges are sitting there, they don't really give away anything, especially Simon," she explained. "So you're like,' Have I done good, have I done bad?', and I didn't really know."