Once known as Boyzone's bad boy, these days singer-turned-actor Shane Lynch is a very different person. After becoming a committed Christian a couple of years ago, he's turned his life around and is now getting his career back on track by taking up acting with a new role in Sky One's football drama Dream Team, as well as returning to music. But at the turn of the millennium life wasn't good for Shane. His marriage to Eternal singer Easther Bennett had broken down and Boyzone had come to an unsure end.
Shane took up a career as a racing driver, with some success, but when it became obvious that Boyzone frontman Ronan Keating wasn't going to abandon his solo career for a reunion with the band, a distraught Shane's already renowned drinking habit turned into a drinking problem.
"When Ro didn't come back, that angered me," says the 28-year-old.
"If he'd have told us he wasn't coming back, then no problem. We could have set ourselves up and known our direction.
"But he fobbed us off and we were just left lingering. I was left very angry and getting alcohol involved. It was a hard time in my life."
Shane and Ronan are now good mates again. But it was only after Shane's friend Big Ben - the singer from dance act Phats & Small, who now works with Shane in their band Red Hill - introduced him to Christianity that Shane was able to confront his problems and renew the friendship.
Since then he's fallen in love with session singer Sheena White, who he first met years ago at a Party In The Park event. After bumping into each other a number of times, they finally got together two years ago.
When it comes to marriage, however, Shane is taking things slowly this time round.
"I was young the last time," he explains.
"I guess it was to do with confusing attachments in terms of people you work with. Although you spend time with someone it doesn't mean you end up being together and I just got that one wrong really. But, please God, I want to get married again one day. It's something that Sheena and I are definitely working towards. I love her dearly and I would have married her when we first got together - I knew how I felt about her. But I guess I'm trying to be sensible. I'm in no rush."
For now Shane is busy with a career that has been kick-started by his win on this year's series of celebrity sports show The Games.
With many opportunities now coming his way, both to relaunch his music career and for more TV work, Shane has decided to try his hand at acting with a starring role in Sky One's Dream Team.
"You don't have to be the best at anything in this world," says Shane of his surprise career move.
"You've got good actors out there refusing to do soaps and the like because they're waiting for a break in film, but that film never comes and they're left sitting on their backside.
"But while there's those that believe they're better than that, the likes of me will come along, see an opportunity and take it. You've got to go out there and work, that's the bottom line. It's not Hollywood, it's Dream Team, but it's fantastic for me, thanks."
That's not to say Shane didn't have his worries about stepping into the unknown. He doesn't have any acting training - he hasn't done much more than look moody in Boyzone videos, and Shane happily admits that he was hired for his famous face and name rather than any acting talent.
But rather than look down their noses at this young upstart walking on to their set, Shane's fellow cast members on Dream Team took him under their wing and showed him the ropes.
"I think if I came in thinking I could do this part they might have been like that," says Shane.
"But I came in and said: 'Look lads I'm really scared, I've never done it before. Please bear with me'. I told them the truth and laid my heart on the table. They took that on board and they all wanted to help me out. They gave me a lot of great advice and it was good straight away."
Shane plays arrogant businessman Eli Knox, who has decided to buy Harchester United on a whim. He's slick, unflappable and an astute businessman to boot, and he knows he has all his players very much under control with some clever small print in their contracts.
"Playing him has been good fun," says Shane.
"He's great because he's straightforward, there's no confusion about him. He's the boss and whatever he wants he gets, that's the bottom line. That's his life, with lots of champagne and good living."
Shane's recruitment to Dream Team was very quick. They phoned him up and he was on set the very next day, adding to the pressure he was feeling.
It meant he had no time to call his former Boyzone bandmate Keith Duffy, who now plays Ciaran McCarthy in Coronation Street, and ask for advice.
"I've spoken to him about it since but more about what I'm doing," says Shane.
"He's just said to me, 'Well done, good stuff', he's not given me any advice. I always knew Keith would go into acting," he continues.
"He was always the one who loved doing TV. He liked being on screen, being in front of a camera, and reading autocues. I always knew he was going to go in that direction.
"But it's been an interest for me for quite some time as well. I just didn't think I'd ever actually do it - I didn't think I'd be brave enough. I was actually quite frightened of it all, but there were so many people telling me I should try it."
Shane had actually helped Keith out when he started on Coronation Street, though he didn't realise it at the time. Since joining the soap, Keith has said he based his character Ciaran on Shane.
It's something that Shane seems a little embarrassed about.
"He didn't base Ciaran on me exactly," he says.
"But he did say to me that, like me on Dream Team, he was scared about what way to play it, so he played it how he thought I might be or how I might deal with a situation. Which is quite flattering really.
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