- It's just cool,
when you have such a big spotlight and you're such an idol
to a lot of women.
- You're the idol ma'am.
You're the 'American Idol'.
- [Nicole] Because you're all of our 'American Idol'.
- Girl, you're fabulous.
You are the 'American Idol' first winner.
That is fabulous, Kelly.
- And I've been following you since Idol.
- [Kelly] Oh my God. - During the beginning.
- I am not gonna cry 'cause Glo will kill me.
- I was there when you won.
- [Kelly] You were?
- [Sandra] I was. - Oh, wow.
- I've seen you on 'American Idol'.
I love you.
- If you know how much I hear your name at Idol.
- Times have changed.
You're hosting the show now.
And I'm just the guest.
- [Kelly] I'm trying to be you.
- This is so exciting. I'm so happy. So proud.
(upbeat music)
- The first time I saw you live
you were winning 'American Idol'.
- [Kelly] Oh my gosh.
- You know, and it worked.
- I was there.
And I started sobbing when she won.
- Me too.
- Because she was sobbing too.
And someone turned around in the audience and went
"That's so sweet. Is that your daughter?"
(audience laughs)
- No.
- My husband was working on a TV show, 'Angel' at the time.
And he was supposed to work.
- I love 'Angel'.
- Oh thanks.
He happened to be chopping-
Cutting flowers, but with a knife, which is dumb.
And he slit his wrist.
They gave him the day off and I was like,
"Great. You can come to 'American Idol' with me."
And so there's a shot of the audience
and he's fake clapping.
But when he went to work the next day, they were like,
"You faked an injury just to go see 'American Idol'?"
And it was like, "No, no, no, truly."
He had to show the stitches.
We were bawling.
- [Kelly] Me too. - We were like, "She won."
- I was like, "I don't have to wait tables." Yeah.
That was my thing.
(audience cheers)
- I have a funny story for you.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- So I told my mom, I was gonna be on your show today.
And she's like, "Kelly Clarkson?"
She's like,
"Do you remember how you bugged me to get a phone
so you could call 'The American Idol'?"
The 'American Idol' she calls it,
"to vote for that woman?"
And I did.
I knew the moment you stepped on the stage,
I was like, "She's gonna win."
- [Kelly] Oh thank you. - Yeah. Yeah
- My sisters, and my parents and I,
we watched every single episode of the first season
of 'American Idol'.
- Were you team Justin or team Kelly?
I'm just kidding.
(Kelly laughs)
Just kidding.
- How about this?
I've seen the movie. I saw 'From Justin to Kelly'.
So both.
- [Kelly] Oh my God.
- We watched that whole first season of 'American Idol'.
And you just blew- - Did you vote?
(audience laughter)
I'm just kidding!
- I think there were four of us in the family
and I think we voted 200 times.
- I'm just kidding. I'm totally kidding.
I'm messing with you.
- We absolutely did.
- [Brandon] So this is at the Dallas Airport.
So we're both from Texas, DFW.
- DF dubs, okay.
- A couple days after you won Idol.
And it was a huge deal for me to see you.
I would pick up my flip phone every night and vote for you.
So you're sitting on the plane
and my mom's like "we have to talk to her".
And I'm like, "Mom, that's so embarrassing. Like, let's not.
Like bless her heart, she's newly famous,
she just wants to ride on the plane".
And you and your bucket hat were on the plane
- [Kelly] And that bucket hat.
I was just talking about that thing.
I was like, that hat. I wore that bucket hat out.
- [Brandon] It's back in a huge way. You were first.
- I am a trendsetter. - Always a trailblazer.
- Always.
- Stop everything. I am such a big fan of yours.
I was doing Conan O'Brien's talk show.
- [Kelly] Love Conan O'Brien.
- And I was backstage, and it was the night.
It was the night of the finale.
- Yes.
- I forced Conan O'Brien to leave his dressing room early.
So I could watch.
Because I didn't know where,
it was like, we didn't have phones back then
that showed you TV.
- Oh my god! - So I watched it.
I remember getting so excited about it.
And I just can't believe that you were so great.
- That was so unexpected and so nice.
- You belong to me and my daughter.
- [Kelly] I will cry right now at that statement,
that's so nice.
- You know, a friend, Kevin,
who was a musical director there.
- Yeah.
- Gave me tickets so that I could take my children,
'cause my daughter loved 'American Idol'
and we got to see you win.
- [Kelly] Oh my gosh.
- You were on 'American Idol' and you won.
And I was like, that's it I'm going on 'American Idol'.
- [Kelly] What?
- And then that next week I got an audition
for 'High School Musical' and booked it.
- [Kelly] Well that worked out.
- [Vanessa] So then I was like, well, nevermind.
- [Kelly] That worked out.
- [Vanessa] I was like, I'm doing it.
And you were the catalyst.
- You are one of the reasons for my career.
And I will explain why.
- What? I mean, you're welcome.
- I was watching 'American Idol'.
Okay. Well, first of all, this is a surprise for you.
This is the day we met.
- [Kelly] I remember you and I remembered going
that girl is special.
- You're so sweet.
- and like look at your career.
- You're so, thank you.
(audience cheers)
I remember I watched you on 'American Idol'
and I was just like so,
I just fell in love with you.
I was like, I wanna audition for 'American Idol'.
And sure enough they did 'American Juniors'.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- I auditioned for that.
- [Kelly] It was so cool.
- It's because of all that, that it led to the acting.
- [Kelly] I specifically remember it, our conversation.
- I'm gonna say it's because of Kelly Clark that I'm here.
- Now, I'm just going to say that too.
You're welcome, Lucy.
- But when I was in Iraq music was like, my salvation.
So when I came out to Australia
I learned I could create a career out of this.
And so I remember one day I was watching a TV show
and I see this woman
and I'm thinking now she's got one hell of a voice, right.
And it was you.
So that day I realized, you know what?
If she can do it, I can as well.
- [Joel] My wife Kathy was diagnosed with breast cancer.
- [Kelly] Oh.
- Way back when, when you were just starting in
on 'American Idol'.
That's what started the Photo Ark,
was my desire to stay closer to home.
We watched 'American Idol' and we watched you win.
- Oh my gosh.
- [Joel] And my wife is just fine to this day
'cause you cheered her up,
and she's sitting right next to me.
- Oh my gosh. Hello.
(audience cheers)
- I had this amazing friend named Stanley DeSantis.
- [Kelly] Okay.
- Who was in a TV show called 'Tales of the City' with me.
- Yeah.
- [Laura] We watched you every week on 'American Idol'.
- What!
- We rooted for you from the very beginning?
- What is happening!
(audience cheers)
- Are you serious?
- We would call each other.
He lived in Los Angeles, I lived in New York.
It was like, our thing was to watch you.
- Oh my gosh.
- I mean, we were all over it.
And he's no longer with us, my friend Stanley.
- [Kelly] Oh.
- But every time I see you, I think of him.
So you mean more to me than you ever knew.
- Somebody was talking about a moment like this
that people use it for weddings a lot.
And I was like, I remember Neil telling me.
Was that y'all's dance?
Was that the song that you-
- [Neil] That was our first dance song.
That was our song, Kelly Clarkson, that song.
We met during, I think season two of 'American Idol'.
We were falling in love at that same time.
And the lyrics to that song always kind of stayed with us.
And we always said, if we ever got married
that would be a great first dance song.
- The reason why I have had longevity
is the man behind that keyboard right there.
And his name is Jason Halbert.
- [Randy] Jason's a bad boy.
- [Kelly] And wait, wait.
And this is the best part.
Jason actually was hired by Randy Jackson to be in my band.
- [Michael] Wow, really?
- [Kelly] When I won Idol, yes.
Actually he was hired for Justin, but I stole him.
- I've been a fan since 'American Idol' and-
- Wow, that's almost 20 years worth.
That's alright, that's alright.
- [Laverne] Isn't that crazy?
The music is so powerful because it takes us,
we can go right back to a moment in our lives.
- All of it, yeah.
- It's so beautiful.
And so thank you so much for giving us that
and now you're continuing it with your show.
Thank you. Thank you, Kelly.
You are a national treasure.
- [Kelly] Oh, thank you. I love doing it.
- I mean, the fact that you made it as big as you did
not only is a testament to your talent,
but a testament to how huge 'American Idol' was
just out of the gate.
When you won that show, did you think,
- [Kelly] No.
- This is gonna be
my career is going to be as big as it turned out?
- I thought I'm gonna be
the most famous cocktail waitress in Texas.
(laughs)
- I actually genuinely do not believe
we would be sitting here today
if you hadn't entered the show back then.
(audience cheers drowns out speaker)
- Not true.
- [Simon] I'm not trying to speak disrespectfully
to the others, but
I mean, the whole premise of this show was
we had to find a star who was gonna sell records.
You know, we found some great people that whole year
but when you delivered that moment on that first live show
and when you sang that winning song at the end.
- It was a game changer.
- It was a game changer, yeah.
- We looked at each other at the end at finale and said,
"wow, this thing is really gonna work."
I think that was the moment that we knew.
- I have to say something about you, Kelly.
Unlike the majority, you are the same person off camera-
- Absolutely. - 100%
- as you are on camera.
(audience cheers)
- You earn respect from people,
and you've been very loyal and you're a great friend.