One Direction - Dare to Dream - Life as One Direction

I was really shocked by the whole experience of having to run through the crowd, but I made myself enjoy it instead of being scared of it, because I knew it was something special. When we were in the police van afterwards we all sat there going ‘What the hell?’ It was almost as if it hadn’t happened, it was so surreal, but looking back on it now it was an amazing moment.

When tour rehearsals came around we were well aware that we would have to work really hard. We wanted to put on an amazing show and we had a lot of new stuff to learn, including dance routines. We were taught things like how to put more energy into moving around, which is hard when you’re in an empty warehouse performing to no one.

We also had to practise putting talking bits in between songs, which also felt weird because we’d be talking to an audience of six crew members, and even they didn’t respond.

Getting to put everything we’d learnt into practice was the ultimate pay-off for all the hard work we’d done. I can’t even begin to describe what it was like when we all stood on the stage together for the first night of the tour in Birmingham. Looking out and seeing all the banners and hearing thousands of people shouting your name … It really doesn’t get much better than that. We’d performed on The X Factor and we’d done gigs, but nothing compared to this. I had to stand there for a moment just to take it all in, but as soon as we started singing we were off.

I think even that first arena performance in Birmingham was different to anything else we’d ever done in terms of how much energy we put into it and how much we moved around the stage. It felt almost natural being there, even though it was also completely and utterly surreal. There were several times when we all looked at each other and I could tell we were all thinking the same thing – ‘This is incredible!’

The rush you get being on stage in front of so many people is indescribable. I wish everyone could have that feeling. I can be so tired and feeling like I’m in a bad mood, then I get on stage and I feel amazing. I’m so hyped up when I come off stage that I shout a lot and jump around. There’s no feeling like it.

I loved the tour so much I never wanted it to stop. I didn’t even get homesick, because we were so busy we didn’t get time to think about it, but I actually felt really guilty about that. All in all we were pretty well behaved on the tour, but we had our moments, like the fruit fight. At least we didn’t throw any TVs out of windows or anything … but there’s still time.

The wrap party at the end of the tour was good, but we all felt sad saying goodbye to everyone. I was up until about five in the morning so I was a bit tired the next day, but we had a day off to chill out so it didn’t matter too much.

When the tour was over, Louis, his mate Stan, my friend Johnny and I all went off on a skiing holiday together. I’d never been skiing before and I was desperate to give it a go. We had a brilliant laugh in Courchevel and I’d love to go back again.

We worked really hard on the album to find the right songs. They needed to be perfect. We wanted our first single to be a big summer song. For instance, when the Black Eyed Peas single ‘I Gotta Feeling’ came out in 2009 it was the song of the summer. When everyone heard it, it reminded them of all the good times they’d had. We wanted our first single to be like that and be the song that everyone would remember.

The people we got to work with on the album were incredible. Steve Robson is very, very talented and has worked with James Morrison and Take That and all sorts of people. Working with RedOne and Rami was very cool too because they’re legendary. It feels so odd to be working in all of these studios that we would never have even dreamed of walking into before we were in the band. It was quite surreal.

Having our first book go to number one in the book charts was also pretty unbelievable. We were excited about it being out there and hoped that some fans would buy it, but we didn’t realise just how many would get it. It was a complete shock and really exciting. The fans that came along to the book signings were incredible. I got given a lot of turtles because I once said I liked them, and it’s so cool when people remember little things you’ve said and chat to you about them.

We’ve done so many brilliant things this year. Filming the documentary was an interesting experience, but we are used to the cameras now so we all felt pretty chilled out about it. Photo shoots are always cool too. Even though we’ve done them before, each time it feels like a new experience.

Going on the Alan Titchmarsh show was a good laugh, because it’s one of those shows that everyone has seen. And he was a really nice guy. That was the first proper TV thing we did after The X Factor, so it’s one that we’ll always remember.

LOOKING FORWARD

One of the surprising things about being in the band is how committed fans are to us. Some of them came to loads of dates on the tour. People still don’t expect you to recognise them, though. There was a girl who was in our hotel one day who had been on loads of the tour, and she was really shocked that we’d remembered her name and knew who she was – but of course we do. We remember people just like anyone else would, and it’s nice to have the chance to get to know them properly.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever get used to the press attention. It still feels very strange when I pick up a newspaper and something has been written about me. It sometimes feels like I’m reading about someone else. But as long as people carry on writing nice things about us I don’t mind.

As a band, we’re having the absolute best time ever. We’ve become better friends than I could ever have imagined and it’s so nice to have four other lads to share this experience with. If ever one of us is down the others pick him up, and we’ve got really good at coming up with ideas and putting things into practice as a group. I think we’re going to get tighter and tighter as time goes on.

Out of all the things that we have coming up, what we’re most excited about is getting out on the One Direction tour. We can see a lot more of the fans and they can see us performing our songs. It’s down to us to show what we’re all about, and we’re looking forward to doing exactly that.

We’ve got a lot of big dreams. We want to have number ones, travel a lot, go back to America and have as much fun as possible. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.

QUICKFIRE

DOB: 1/02/1994

STAR SIGN: Aquarius

favourite …

FILM: Love Actually, The Notebook, Titanic – there are so many (but I tell everyone it’s Fight Club)

BODY PART: My hands, because I’ve always been told that they’re soft

FOOD: I love sweetcorn

ALBUM: 21 by Adele

FRIEND: Louis Tomlinson

CELEBRITY LADY: Frankie Sandford

SHOP: Selfridges

DRINK: I’ve been trying to just drink water but I love apple juice

COLOUR: Orange

TV SHOW: Family Guy

AFTERSHAVE: Blue by Chanel

PERFUME: Alien by Thierry Mugler

COMPUTER GAME: Fifa

IPHONE APP: Texts From Last Night, where people send in texts that people have sent them when they’re drunk. My friend Ali and I send good ones to each and some of them are so funny