David Hoyle

A 47-year-old charity worker who says she has never been kissed is now a YouTube sensation after a singing performance that wowed the notoriously harsh talent judge Simon Cowell.

The YouTube video of Susan Boyle's performance has had more than 5 million hits

Susan Boyle, from West Lothian in Scotland, appeared on the television show “Britain’s Got Talent” last weekend with an inauspicious start.

Slightly plump with short brown curly hair, and bearing a striking resemblance to former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, Boyle stood somewhat uncomfortably in the middle of the stage wearing a gold lace sheath. She told the judges and the audience of the show that she was single, she lived with her cat, Pebbles, and she had never been kissed.

“I’m trying to be a professional singer,” Boyle asserted, as the audience laughed. “Or possibly Communist Party Chairman.”

When she added that she wanted to be as famous as Elaine Paige, who’s been called the “first lady of British musical theater,” some members of the audience snickered and rolled their eyes.

But after Boyle sang the first few notes of “I Dreamed a Dream” from the musical “Les Miserables,” the audience erupted in wild cheers and applause, and two of the three judges’ jaws dropped.

The applause lasted the length of her performance, which ended with the crowd on its feet. Cowell, who also serves as a judge on “American Idol” and who’s known for his stinging criticism of those he deems to have no talent, said Boyle’s performance was fantastic.

“I knew the minute you walked out on that stage that we were going to hear something extraordinary,” he proclaimed. “And I also felt you might invade Czechoslovakia.”