How Jimmy Barnes’ secret love child found out the REAL identity of her rock star dad – after she was fed a lifetime of little white lies

EXCLUSIVE 

Katy Lee Carroll had every reason to feel nervous during a private audience with Jimmy Barnes the night before Cold Chisel played a sold-out concert in Queensland.

Not only was she in the company of the legendary Australian rock band’s lead singer but this was Carroll’s first encounter with the father she had never met.

Carroll spent the first 15 years of her life wrongly believing the man she called Daddy was her father, and almost two decades trying to establish her paternity.

Along the way, she had hired a private investigator and followed frustratingly false leads, while – unknown to Barnes – bearing him two more grandchildren. 

Barnes announced on Instagram two days before Christmas he had an eighth child, on top of his four kids with 67-year-old wife Jane and three others from previous relationships.

But neither the 68-year-old rocker nor 37-year-old Carroll, his second-youngest offspring, has ever disclosed how she came to be a part of their family.

Carroll had grown up listening to Cold Chisel – an uncle who helped raise her played Flame Trees, Choir Girl and My Baby over and over whenever she stayed at his place. 

She had also experienced a feeling her real father was a rock star, according to a close friend. 

‘She said she always felt something bigger,’ the friend said. 

Katy Lee Carroll learnt Jimmy Barnes was her father five years ago and met him for the first time the night before a Cold Chisel concert in February 2020. Father and daughter are pictured together

Daily Mail Australia can reveal Carroll first met Barnes on February 7, 2020 at Kingscliff in the Northern Rivers region of NSW not far from where she lives.

Also present at that dinner were Carroll’s husband and two daughters. 

Barnes, who had travelled north with Jane, was performing the next night with Cold Chisel as part of A Day on the Green at Sirronet Wines in Mount Cotton, about 30km south-east of Brisbane. 

Two months earlier, Cold Chisel had released their ninth studio album Blood Moon and were spending the summer touring to promote the new record.

The first single off the album was Getting the Band Back Together. 

Carroll was by then a married mother-of-two who desperately wanted to be part of a family but was just as conscious of not wanting to disrupt the famously tight Barnes clan.

Before meeting, Carroll and Barnes had spoken on the phone but summer bushfires near his home in the NSW Southern Highlands had prevented them getting together in Sydney. 

In an effort to make everyone more comfortable, Carroll wrote a deeply personal letter – addressed to both Jimmy and Jane – which she gave to the couple at Kingscliff, having previously shown it to several friends.

Carroll was particularly concerned about Jane’s feelings, as she had been conceived during the Bangkok-born multilingual musician’s marriage to Barnes. 

Katy Lee Carroll (above) spent the first 15 years of her life wrongly believing the man she called Dad was her father, and almost two decades trying to establish her paternity

She told the Barneses of her struggles growing up, particularly of coping with learning her mother’s husband was not her father after they divorced when she was 15.

Two years later Carroll believed her real father was a man called Ian who had worked on the roads and she began trying to find him. 

She hired a private investigator but with only a first name and vague occupation the search was futile and her confusion continued.

When Carroll was 20 she met the man she would marry and felt a love she had never experienced. She fell pregnant and her life took on a new purpose. 

It was not until her 32nd birthday in September 2019 that Carroll’s mother said she believed Barnes might be her father. From that moment, her whole world changed again.

The letter Carroll wrote to Jimmy and Jane expressed her fears of never really belonging anywhere and an ambition for her own children to grow up with more stability than she ever had. 

It acknowledged the shock her emergence as a new member of the ever-growing Barnes family must have created and expressed her yearning to be accepted by them.

Having waited so long for this moment and prepared for the meeting so carefully, that meeting in Kingscliff was the start of all Carroll’s wishes being granted.

Carroll has been welcomed into the Barnes family. Circled left to right are Carroll, Mahalia, Jimmy and Jane Barnes. Behind Jimmy is Carroll’s husband AJ Gilbert

Since then, Carroll has been ’embraced by the Barnes family with love, warmth and incredible understanding’, she has said. 

The next night Carroll watched her father’s band open their performance at A Day on the Green with Standing on the Outside. It was her first Cold Chisel gig. 

Carroll’s friend said that now it was public knowledge Barnes had an eighth child it was time for more of her own story to be understood.

‘Katy has a very spectacular story and it should be brought to life as she is a lot like her father in a lot of ways,’ the friend said. 

‘Katy is very open about her childhood struggles and is very proud of that fact she was able to achieve the things she has, given the trajectory of her life should have been different. 

‘She openly talks to many people and makes people feel comfortable and confident to talk about their struggles and traumas.

‘She is truly a beautiful and remarkable person.’

Carroll is raising two daughters with husband AJ Gilbert, a handy rugby back-rower who grew up at Dorrigo on the NSW Northern Tablelands.

Jimmy Barnes is pictured (left) leading Cold Chisel at Sirronet Wines as part of A Day on the Green on February 8, 2020, the night after he first met his daughter Katy 

Gilbert won an Under-19 World Cup with Australia before spending two seasons with the Queensland Reds, and playing league with teams including the Ipswich Jets. 

He captained Northern Suburbs in Sydney’s Shute Shield competition and turned out for two games for the NSW Waratahs, then spent spent three years in Japanese club rugby.

At the start of 2017, Carroll, Gilbert and their two daughters returned to Australia and settled in Coffs Harbour on the NSW north coast to be near their families.

Gilbert was lured to the Orara Valley Axemen, a local league team long sponsored by Russell Crowe, and has since held roles with Southern Cross University Marlins as head coach and director of rugby.

Carroll became managing director of The Voice of a Survivor, supporting victims of institutional child sexual abuse, but left that role well before the business went bankrupt. She now works as a real estate agent.

Barnes chronicled his traumatic early childhood in his 2016 memoir Working Class Boy, which describes how violence followed his family when they moved from Glasgow to Adelaide.

The once-wild musician fathered three children, including now 51-year-old Today Extra host David Campbell, when he was still a teenager. 

Campbell, who was raised by his maternal grandmother Joan – believing her to be his mother – learnt Barnes was his father while he was in primary school. 

Carroll is pictured with Jimmy Barnes and his son David Campbell along with his three children, Leo and twins Betty and Billy

Barnes’s daughters Amanda Bennett and Megan Torzyn, now aged in their early 50s, met their father for the first time in 2010. 

Carroll was born six years after Barnes’ May 1981 marriage to Jane, who once told a magazine it was ‘really lovely’ to learn her husband had two other daughters.

‘Jimmy is the love of my life and if he has children who are like him and like my children, for me that’s really lovely,’ she said in September 2010.

Carroll need not to have worried about the reception should would get from Jimmy, Jane and their brood: Elly-May, who is now 35, Jackie, 39, Eliza-Jane, 40, and Mahalia, 42.

While Carroll’s relationship with Barnes was not publicly known until December last year she had long been privately inside the fold.

Her Instagram account features photographs of her with Barnes, Jane, Mahalia, Jackie and David Campbell, along with the TV presenter’s three children.

A photograph of Carroll sitting next to Mahalia and also featuring their father and his wife was posted to Barnes’s official Instagram account in September 2023.

Carroll, who was tagged in the post, replied: ‘We love you.’

Carroll (right) is pictured with father and his daughter Mahalia above the caption ‘heart is full… birthday weekend away full of food and love’, with a thank you message to Jimmy and Jane

Another picture on Carroll’s account showing her with her father and Mahalia was captioned ‘heart is full… birthday weekend away full of food and love’, with a thank you message to Jimmy and Jane.

Barnes’s Instagram post revealing Carroll to the world began: ‘Christmas is all about family and we would like to introduce my daughter Katy Lee, who has been in our lives for the past five years.’

‘Katy is a wonderful woman and since discovering that I was her biological father, our family and extended family have loved getting to know her.

‘It’s been heartwarming to see good relationships growing with her sisters and brothers.

‘We have always respected her very strong desire to keep her family life private and will continue to support her.’

Jane responded to her husband’s post: ‘Go Katy, we all love you.’ 

Shortly after Barnes posted about Carroll she made her own statement confirming she had found out Barnes was her father five years earlier.

‘Since that moment, I’ve been embraced by the Barnes family with love, warmth and incredible understanding,’ she said.

Carroll (left) was born six years after Barnes’s May 1981 marriage to Jane, who had once told a magazine it was ‘really lovely’ to learn her husband had two other daughters

‘Over these years we’ve slowly, carefully gotten to know one another and this journey has been one of patience, respect and tenderness.

‘It’s been a deeply meaningful process and I am truly grateful for the bonds we are building together.’

Carroll said she had wanted to ‘open up about something very personal’.

‘This journey of discovering my family has brought up a lot of complex emotions and I ask for your understanding as I navigate this alongside the joy of reconnecting with my father and his family,’ she said.

Carroll described being welcomed into ‘such a talented and kind family’ as an ‘extraordinary gift’.

‘This discovery, though exciting, has been approached with great thoughtfulness, not only for me, but also for my children and all of our extended families.

‘As we continue to nurture these relationships, I remain committed to protecting our privacy, allowing each of us to grow and heal in our own time.

‘Thank you for your understanding, compassion, and respect during this deeply personal chapter of my life. Your support means more than words can express.’

Carroll and Barnes were contacted for comment. Barnes’s manager has previously said neither Barnes nor Carroll would be making an further comment on their relationship.   

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