United Kingdom, Aug. 8 -- Selena Gomez's "whole life changed" when she joined Wizards of Waverly Place.

The 33-year-old actress auditioned for a series of TV shows, including the spin-off of Lizzie McGuire, before she joined the cast of Wizards of Waverly Place, the hit Disney Channel sitcom.

Selena - who starred on the TV show between 2007 and 2012 - said on the Therapuss with Jake Shane podcast: "It was actually a weird thing because I was on three pilots for the Disney channel. One was the spin-off of Lizzie McGuire. One was the spin-off of the Suite Life of Zach and Cody and the last one was Wizards.

"So by then all of them didn't get picked up and I was just kind of at my wits end, but not in a bad way just kind of thought 'okay, ...