Former Pussycat Dolls star Carmit Bachar says the band were made "very aware" of Nicole Scherzinger's ambitions for a solo career during the time they were together.

In 2009 - the girl group announced a minor hiatus which was later revealed to be an official break up.

Bachar - who left the band in February 2008 - says Scherzinger's ruthless aspirations became too much for the others to handle.

Speaking to British newspaper The Daily Mail, she said: "She’s ambitious and she’s driven and she wanted to have her solo career. We were made very aware of that. I was never thinking about a lead, to me a group is a group, so I thought it was gonna be more of like all of us.

She added: "We didn’t think it was going to veer to being as much of Nicole as it did. We thought of her as being the lead vocalist and spearheading the situation but then it really became a separation between us."

Bachar also said Scherzinger's secret battle with bulimia also affected her relationship with the rest of the girls because of her mood swings.

She continued: "It’s quite scary but obviously that can affect you deeply, emotionally obviously there are things there that need to be dealt with too but we were working so hard so we didn’t think.

The red-headed star added: "I might be stupid and oblivious to things, but I didn’t see any of that,’ she said. Obviously people who have disorders like that are very good at hiding it. I feel stupid though not knowing. We were so close and I was shocked. I thought how could you hide that? We would go out together, go to dinners, label dinners, and we’d all eat and I mean when do you have time to do that? I don’t understand it."