New Daily Mirror 3am girl Caroline Hedley has said she has wanted to write for the celebrity gossip column ever since it launched four years ago.
Hedley told Press Gazette: “I was on holiday when 3am launched and I remember reading it and thinking, ‘That must be the most fantastic job there is’.”
She started her career as a researcher on The Mail on Sunday features desk while still at university and then spent nearly four years writing about entertainment for free London daily Metro, before moving to More! magazine for two years.
Hedley, who started on 3am last week, admitted that the hours were long but said the compensations more than made up for it.
“No two days are the same. We get in the office quite early, before 10am, and start finding out what our lead stories are for conference and checking with PRs that our stories are legitimate. We source most of them ourselves and go out most nights. The other girls are in LA at the moment so they’ve been filing all their stories from over there.
“It’s a really exciting and unique environment.
It’s very pressured, but it’s a positive pressure because you know you’re working on the best column there is.”
She said she generally left the office at around 7.30pm and headed out to whatever party she was covering. “If you look at that as part of your working day, it’s a long time, but it’s something I really enjoy.”
Hedley joins Jessica Callan and Eva Simpson on the column and replaces Niki Waldegrave.
By Dominic Ponsford
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