Avril Ramona Lavigne is a Canadian singer-songwriter that achieved pop stardom at a tender age of 17. She was my hero. Her first album Let Go was my High School anthem. She gave me the permission to hang out with the boys and learn how to skate. She made wrist bands and neckties looked cool. I idolized her and she was everything that I wanted to be.

I was in 6th grade when I first picked up my dad’s guitar. He refused to teach me how to play because he himself had to learn it on his own. I basically lost all interest after a while until Avril showed up in her music video of Complicated. Clad with eyeliner and easily strumming a guitar. And I thought to myself I want to be like that.

If you would listen to her album Let Go, a then 17 year old Avril was singing about boys: skater boys, preppy boys, jerk boys. Growing up in a small town in Ontario, Canada. Falling in love and falling out of love. But most of all she was singing about being who you are and not giving a damn about what other people think. And I thought to myself she gets me.

I spent hours listening to her songs. Stopping and playing my beaten up cassette player, lyrics in hand, memorizing her every song, pretending that I made those songs, that I was Avril, and I was famous.

In High School I had not 1 but 2 large posters of her. I basically dressed like her, down to the wristbands. I traded all of my colored and printed shirts for black ones just so that I can keep pulling off that punk-rock look. For a class project, I wrote a radio play that revolves around a High School girl being in love for the first time to someone who turns out to be the worst guy to fall in love with a.k.a Skater Boi. I used all Avril Lavigne songs that I myself sang while my best friend Mae played the guitar, who loved Avril as much as I did. The play was a hit! Not only did it earn us a high grade, our radio play was played out to the rest of the English class in the whole school. Since then I was the “Avril” of our school. That was about the only good thing that happened to me in High School.

I was already in college when Under My Skin came out. Avril’s second studio album talked about more heartbreak and more complications. By then my musical influences expanded to The Used, Silverchair, Taking Back Sunday, Coheed and Cambria, and other screamo/emo/punk bands. I hanged out with metal heads that considered Avril’s music as derivative pop and not at all punk. When Amy Lee of Evanescence came out, Avril’s fans lessened. Amy Lee was the new black (goth?).

I still listened to Avril but only under the covers. I was in college. I just moved out of my parents and moved to an entirely new country, to an entirely new city. I was longing for familiarity and was in desperate need of acceptance from anybody. When my friends said that Avril was not cool, I said she’s not cool.

I got rid of my wristbands. I replaced my all black ensemble with checkered prints and cut my long high lighted hair short. I dropped the guitar act and focused on being a vocalist of a ska punk cover band. I no longer wanted to be Avril. I no longer wanted to be mainstream famous. It was all about being “under ground”.

Two years and a new school later, Avril came up with her 3rd album The Best Damn Thing and you know what, it really wasn't. Gone was the angsty teenager who complained about jerk boys and was easily replaced as my punk-rock look, by a soon to be wed adult who now sings about trying to steal one. Girlfriend came out and I kind of hated myself for liking, nay, loving it. I thought I was way past and over this.

By the time I moved to a different school, I've stopped drinking and all of my self proclaimed rocker friends dropped out of radar. I became a loner, gone back to reading books and stopped being in a band. I was in a new university, in an entirely new place. It was an oppurtunity to start fresh and come up with a new identity. Something that doesn’t try so hard to be “cool”. For the first time in a long time I was being myself.

Being myself paid off really well. I was in a relationship with a nice non-jerky boy who likes basketball and computer games. He was in no less “complicated”. My classmates liked me, even wanted to be around me. My peers expanded to almost the entirety of the whole Medical Science department. Professors adored me and would recommend me on hosting school events, encouraged me to write on the school paper (never happened) and expected me to be one of the best of the batch.

I graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in hand by 2010. Avril was going through a divorce and her cult status diminished.

Indie bands were my companion to countless commutes to work. Traffic was not as painful when you’re listening to Spoon, War Paint, The Kooks, Vampire Weekend, Band of Horses and a bunch of other bands some of my friends haven’t even heard of. And Lady Gaga, I was definitely into Lady Gaga, like big time.

Avril Lavigne rang 2013 with the release of her self named 5th album. I haven’t heard not one song out of it and there is a questionable fear attached with the idea of even trying to. With the aid of YouTube I was informed that she has a single called Hello Kitty and the thumbnail suggests Japanese back up dancers and a lot of pink. And I thought to myself, nope, I’m good.

Fast forward to present, I must admit that even though I've lost the love I used to have for Avril Lavigne, I still listen to Let Go, in fact I’m listening to it right now, which may be the reason of all this. I find myself going back to the memory of me, kneeling beside my beaten up cassette player, silently agreeing with everything Avril had to say.

I’m not saying I’m too good for Avril Lavigne. She’s not alone in the list of things I used to fangirl about and now as an adult just lost taste for. I’m glad I used to like her and I’m glad I got to talk about it now. Avril saved me from the torments of High School man! Her songs was like a promise that everything will be alright. And sure she turned out to be something completely different from that mental image I strongly cling on to — eyeliner, tank top, necktie, wristbands and her tongue sticking out. Arguably she has gone from great to bad to “uhhmmm what’s going on here?!” but at least she still has a career, she’s not into drugs, zero sex scandals under her belt (as far as I know of) and she has a 17-carat diamond ring to boot courtesy of her husband. So I guess it’s still a pretty good choice for a child hood hero.

Avril’s musical career may have devolved in my books but she definitely kick started the evolution of mine. So thanks Avril. It’s been really good.