I studied politics at Exeter University between 1998 and 2001. I got depressed in my second year: I had come out, there was lots of change and I couldn’t cope. I was sad and miserable for a long time. I saw a therapist at the university, who was great. Then, in the summer holidays, I travelled in Africa for three weeks. I remember going back to Exeter for my final year and feeling very differently about myself. I moved into 7 Well Street and it felt like a new beginning.

Number 7 was a sweet terraced house with four bedrooms, a small sitting room and a tiny kitchen. You had to climb up a ladder to the garden, which was three feet by seven; I strung up lights and planted rosemary, lilies and orange salvias.

I had three housemates: a guy who was studying engineering and two girls, a history student and a sociology student. We all got on well. I am still friends with the girls.

The house, however, was disgusting and furnished horribly, with carpets that your feet stuck to. There was an upstairs bathroom, but the shower was rubbish and we didn’t have a shower curtain the entire time we lived there. We did nothing to the interior of the house — it was beyond repair, so we just let it rot.

There was an army of slugs that used to attack at night. We hung all our washing to dry over the radiators and the backs of chairs. When we woke up in the morning, there would be trails of slime all over our clothes. We could never work out where the slugs came from.

We led typical student lives. We used to have arguments over the bathroom in the morning and I used to get told off for not buttering my toast on a bread board or plate. All we ate was toast and noodles. The cleaning rota never worked, and there were rows about that. But we had so much fun.

We had loads of parties. Next door there was a corner shop and off-licence; we’d go there and get cider. I worked in a restaurant called Harry’s, which was two minutes away, and I always used to get a free bottle of wine at the end of the night.

In my room, I had a futon and a big dressing-up cupboard with loads of stuff in it. There were always themed parties, and I loved second-hand clothes. I found out after I left that the girls used to nose around my room and try on all my gear.

The house was definitely a home for me. I remember when my grandfather died; after the funeral, I drove back to Well Street to collect my thoughts, even though it was the holidays.

I was also in the house when I filled out the application form for Pop Idol — I even sent it from the postbox in Well Street. I was with my friend Adam, who is now an actor living in America, and I remember saying to him: “God, I think I might win this.”

Before Pop Idol, I’d done a few auditions, and once sent a tape off to a BBC talent show. I used to rehearse in a car park round the corner, because it had really good acoustics, and I’d record songs onto my minidisc. If anyone saw me, I would just scuttle away. I was really embarrassed by my singing, because I thought it was showing off. I didn’t like the attention, which seems funny now.

We moved out of Well Street when we finished our exams in the summer of 2001, and I started Pop Idol two months later. I always think of Well Street as the place where I got my feet back on the ground after my depression. During that final year, I organised a charity ball, got the lead in a musical, won a scholarship to a theatre school in Chiswick, west London, and auditioned for Pop Idol. It was a great time for me, despite the slugs.

Will Young’s greatest-hits compilation, The Hits, is released on November 16

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