KNOWING FRIDA INSIDE HER RAGS TO RICHES STORY

As she turns 80, we look back at the bombshell moments that changed her life

- 

Just as her band ABBA cooed in their hit song The Way Old Friends Do, singer Anni-Frid Lyngstad – or Frida as she’s known to millions – has lived a storied life full of “times of joy and times of sorrow”.

In fact, her life has been so tumultuous, even bandmate Björn Ulvaeus once claimed her story would serve perfectly as a play or musical.

“Out of all four of us, Frida’s had the most dramatic life,” he says. “Her life is the classic rags-to-riches story. I can just picture the scenes and the cliffhangers.”

Now as the iconic hitmaker turns the big 8-0, Woman’s Day looks back on her extraordinary life that has as many crescendos as an ABBA ballad...

CHILDHOOD TRAUMA

Born in Bjørkåsen, Norway, in 1945, Frida’s tragic story first began when her young mum Synni got pregnant with a child by German SS officer Alfred Haase, who’d been stationed there during the Nazi occupation.

After he was rumoured to have died on his way back to Germany, Synni was ostracised from her town when people discovered who the father of her “war baby” was.