When I was growing up, my parents were almost involved in various volunteer things. My dad was head of Planned Parenthood. And it was very controversial to be involved with that.

When I stopped Simply Red the reason was to bring up my daughter Romy. I wanted to be a dad that was around.

What helped a lot was becoming a dad at 47. I can't begin to imagine how I would have coped when I was just starting out with Simply Red. Gabriella and I would have been another one of those divorce statistics.

Because of Carrie, I have my wonderful son Zeke Young, who I love. So I would never change what happened.

I thought I was grounded. I thought from my kinda blue-collar outlook on life that I would call myself a grounded person. I was not. I was like a balloon flying around in the air. And as soon as our first child was born, boom - my feet came right down to the ground.

You know, I have seven children, so I guess I know some things about life.