A FATHER will have mixed feelings as his 18-year-old daughter bids to become a pop star live on television this weekend.

Chris Jones will watch this Saturday's Pop Idols programme hoping former Lancaster Girl's Grammar School pupil Callandria can make it through to the grand final.

But another part of him is apprehensive about her being around the sex, drugs, and rock and roll lifestyle of pop stars as portrayed in tabloid newspapers.

Callandria has already beaten 10,000 hopefuls to win a place in the last 50 of the competition. The show, screened on ITV, is a talent contest to find a pop soloist who can storm the charts in 2002.

Previous rounds were judged by a panel, but on Saturday Callandria will be at the mercy of a television audience.

She will perform live along with ten others in the hour long show from 6pm, and then have to wait until 10pm, when the telephone lines close, to see which two contestants have won the viewers' vote.

The winners will join another eight in the grand final later this year.

Chris isn't worried about Callandria being unable to cope with pressure of having to impress millions on a live show.

She was a member of the Sandham Fitchett Dance School, and won many trophies at festivals before moving to the English Youth Ballet.

And she was a pupil at the Doreen Bird Stage School in London earlier this year until she left to form a band called 'Nearsay', ironically a tribute to 'Hearsay' -- the winners of the group version of Pop Idol, 'Pop Stars' last year.

"If you have been doing dance festivals since before you can remember the live performance must be easier," said Chris, who is the managing director of ADREM, a Preston-based advertising and design company.

"She is just used to being on stage. She seems quite cool -- a lot cooler than I would be.

"We are not really a family of performers. It's something she has developed herself.

"She's always wanted to be famous. We will see on Saturday how she copes. It will be nerve racking just watching.

"Part of me doesn't want her to win because you don't know what she is getting into. It seems like a funny sort of world from what I read in the tabloids.

"I don't know if I want her to be part of that. But then she has to go for this opportunity. She will get a fair amount of exposure for doing this, especially if she goes through to the last ten, when somebody may sign her up. "But even so it will help her secure gigs with Nearsay."