Selena Gomez Found Out How Representation on Screen Truly Matters When She Was on 'Wizards of Waverly Place'

We’re pretty sure that if you haven’t been sleeping under a rock, you’ve seen all the stories about how representation on screen matters — and Selena Gomez found it out when she was still a teenager.

During her cover story with Harper’s Bazaar, the “Bad Liar” singer opened up about getting her first brush with the situation when she starred on Disney Channel’s Wizards of Waverly Place.

“I’ll never forget when I was doing my TV show [Wizards of Waverly Place]; I think I was 15 or 16,” Selena started off. “We would do these live tapings every Friday, and one Friday there was this single mother with her four kids. She was Latin, and she came up to me after, crying.”

“Her kids were so excited, but I noticed the mom, so I gave her a hug and asked, ‘Hey, are you OK?’ And she was like, ‘It’s really incredible for my daughters to see that a Latina woman can be in this position and achieve her dreams, someone who isn’t the typical, you know, blonde with blue eyes.’”

Selena knew right then that she wasn’t the typical role model and related to what the mother said.

“I knew what she meant,” she adds. “When I was younger my idol was Hilary Duff! I remember wanting blue eyes too. So I think I recognized then that it meant something to people. That it matters.”