Agnetha Faltskog became a superstar with ‘ABBA’ – better sit down before you see her today, age 73

Ring, Ring spread to several European countries, where it continued its success. By this point, the group was started to get recognition all over the place. One year later, in 1974, they would finally realize their ambitions.

ABBA – ‘Waterloo’ success

They entered Melodifestivalen once again – but this time with a song titled Waterloo. They won the Swedish qualification, and then did something that would change the course of music history before they performed at the Eurovision Song Contest in Brighton: they decided that their group would have a new name.

ABBA was born.

While ABBA went on to win the Eurovision Song Contest – a moment in ABBA history which by many consider to be the most iconic – Agnetha also had other things on her mind.

In 1971, she and Bjorn Ulvaeus got married, and in 1973, they welcomed their firstborn daughter, Linda. In the middle of this ABBA hysteria, which grew by the day, Agnetha was pregnant.

Needless to say, having children, while becoming one of, if not the biggest, groups on the planet, sure was challenging.

In fact, Agnetha explained that she was kind of happy that they didn’t win the Melodifestivalen with Ring Ring, since she just months away from giving birth to Linda.

“I managed to combine marriage, giving birth, divorce and a world-wide success during the 10-12 years we were doing ABBA,” Faltskog said. “It wasn’t easy, I can tell you that. It wasn’t easy leaving home, especially since dad [Bjorn] was away as well. We left our children but we made sure that they were being taken care off.

Agnetha Faltskog – Bjorn Ulveaus

“We weren’t away as much as one might think. If we were away for 14 days, we decided that we’d be home for 14 days as well.”

World-wide success with ABBA was amazing for all its members, but Agnetha still struggled with the fact that she had to leave her children.

It was tough on her, and she even told herself that she might just leave the group.