I have never, and will never, be in a girl group. I don't have the voice, the moves, and certainly not the prerequisite looks. But most of all, because... I'm a boy. Well, more of a bloke, actually.

This fact is somewhat prohibitive when pursuing the actual-girl group dream. But I hoped it might bring an air of objectivity when examining what it's really like to live that dream for BBC TWO's I'm in a Girl Group!

Since the girl group gold rush of the 1950s, three or more girls in matching gowns, with synchronised dance moves and harmonised voices, has been one of pop's sure-fire recipes for success. But along with the stardust and glamour of the fairy-tale life in a girl group comes a whole lot of DRAMA.

In the show, I was keen to explore the personal relationships beneath the polished outward appearance of the groups and have to admit to having been just a tad cynical about how "real" those relationships are, especially in a manufactured pop group.

So we tracked down a sparkling selection of girl group legends from six decades of pop to ask them first-hand what it's really like. These included a Supreme, a Ronette, a Crystal, two Nolans, some Sledge Sisters, three Bangles, a Bananarama, a Spice Girl, an All Saint, two Girls Aloud, a couple of Saturdays, two Pussycat Dolls, and an Atomic Kitten for good measure.

In the re-telling of their stories - some a rags to riches struggle, others an overnight talent show success - there was plenty of heartache, stress and sadness. In fact, hearing of the reality of broken friendships was genuinely moving. For example, Bananarama's Siobhan Fahey's account of her split from the girls who'd become her best friends:

"You go from being best friends to really irritating each other and then not wanting to be around each other and blaming each other for everything... I felt really unhappy, lonely, lost and friendless"

And if the fragile mix of personalities within the band isn't enough of a worry, the outside influence of men or The Man, if you will, looms large in the everyday challenges facing a girl group. From controlling managers and producers...

"He's talented, but he's, he's crazy as a bed bug, you know" (Ronette, Nedra Ross on Phil Spector)

...to the leery gaze of photographers and TV producers (terrible people they are!), it's a constant battle for the girls to be taken seriously as artists and performers. And that's really what the attraction has always been about for all these years... it's the songs and how they're sung that makes these groups great.

Unlike boy bands, girl groups can't rely on the fluttering hearts of the pop-buying public to be a success; it's the same young girls who scream and swoon at the heart-throb boy bands who also buy the most girl-pop records. So the songs have to be of the highest quality.

The Ronettes' Be My Baby is without doubt a contender for the finest pop song of all time, The Spice Girls' Wannabe the most empowering message a whole generation of young British women ever heard, and my own favourite, Cruel Summer by Bananarama, well, that's just a perfect slice of hazy, crazy, youthful yearning for lost love... aaahh... what the girl group does best!

It's not often you see a popular music documentary where the people on screen are almost entirely women, in fact it's practically unheard of (blink and you'll miss the two men who appear in this), so it was a refreshing change for me to interview these feisty and fun-loving women of all ages and I can honestly say there wasn't a diva-like demand from any of them. In fact Kerry Katona even bought our crew a drink... with her own money!

So there are plenty of highs and some painful lows, but the one thing everyone we spoke to agreed on, was that nothing in their lives - the fame, the fortune, even the unlimited shoe budget - can compare to that first moment they stood on stage and thought: "This is it, I've made it - I'm a Star!"

The girl group has the power to make dreams come true. That's a pretty special thing.

Head over to the BBC TWO site to find out more about I'm in a Girl Group, and watch more video clips from the series.

Following on from last years 'I'm in a Rock n Roll Band!' series for BBC2, which sought to explore and unpack the inner workings of how great rock n roll bands work, 'I'm in a Boy Band!' kicks off a three part series looking into the wonderful world of Pop.

The intention with 'I'm in a Boy Band!' was to use the first hand testament of a cross-generational cast to examine what makes up a great Boy Band and to really get under the skin of the male Pop group experience.

The first challenge we faced was, of course, one of definition. What actually is a Boy Band? For many the term represents something of a dirty phrase. A byword for manufactured and the antithesis of authenticity in popular music. But the truth is never that simple. The concept of 'authenticity' in pop music has always been a shaky one at best in my opinion. From the very start our intention was to open up the definition of the Boy Band and explore the commonality, as well as the differences between, 50 years' worth of what is arguably pops most enduring format.

Whether manufactured, self-formed, a band of brothers or a group of strangers; this meant taking everyone from the Four Tops, to the Monkees via the Jackson 5 and on to the likes of One Direction and JLS and applying the same set of standards and principles in an attempt to find some underlying truths at the heart of the Boy Band experience.

Certain timeless traits began to emerge; the importance of having strongly defined characters, a sense of uniformity, sex appeal, as well as an underlying tension between the desire for self-expression and the need for group harmony.

But as well as exploring these larger topics, our interviews also produced their fair share of amusing insights and anecdotes. Personal highlights include; Merrill Osmond casually mentioning the fact that Chuck Norris was The Osmond's Karate mentor and choreographer, Aston from JLS being ribbed by his band mates for being the 'cute one' in the band and the only surviving member of the Four Tops getting so wound up in describing the glory of harmonising that he uses some language Sid Vicious would have been proud of.

In addition to these stories it was fascinating to hear of the personal challenges involved in leaving a Boy Band and getting to grips with life after Pop stardom. I am very grateful for the frankness and candour of the cast for giving us a genuine flavour of the perennial highs and lows of life in the eye of a Pop storm.

I'm sure some of you will question the inclusion and exclusion of certain acts in this documentary... and quite rightly so! In many ways I feel that is one of the jobs of a show like this - to take a view and to instigate debate. These programmes can never be absolute; they are a mixture research, ideas and an application of the best available material. But I do hope the result is an unapologetic and celebratory look at the world of the Boy Band.

'Boy Band' shouldn't be a dirty word, quite the opposite; it has been the channel through which some of the greatest songs, images, characters and youthful memories have flowed for generation after generation of screaming fans ... and long may it continue to be so.