American Idol judge Paula Abdul has spoken of her fight for the show's openly gay contestants to do well - and reveals she even helped George Michael during his pre-out days. "Pushing also revealed that she has always been surrounded with "marvellous, wonderful gay people", and that she even helped George Michael in his pre-out days during his Faith tour. "I was so understanding and so supportive of the fact that it's really difficult living a ... not living your life truthfully, for fear that people won't accept you," she explains. "And it wasn't until years afterwards that he came out - and he had the courage to walk up to me when I was eating dinner with Mike Ovitz at the Ivy - and he came up to me and said, I want to apologize; you're one of the most talented people, and I treated you not so great. And that's because ... I was living a lie of who I was. "And he gave me the biggest hug. And I said, for that my dear, I love you more than ever." NowNowNext's full interview with Paula Abdul is on the link below.