American Idol begins its Hollywood round at 8 tonight on Fox, thousands of auditioners trimmed to a few hundred. And among those few is Lake High School senior Amelia Finefrock.For a recent telephone interview, an Idol publicist insisted that no questions be asked about Hollywood, which has already been recorded, or beyond. But Finefrock, 17, was able to explain how she got that far.Auditioning “was kind of on a whim,” she said. “Our family’s always watched American Idol, and all my family and friends were like, ‘You need to try out for this.’ And I was just, like, ‘Oh, you know, maybe I should! … I think I’ll go for it.’ ”She has been singing “my whole life. I’ve been doing local theater and some regional theater, and I’ve always been interested in musical theater. And I’ve sung in talent shows and with my family at church. It’s always been in my family. My mom has been a singer … and it just rubbed off on me.”You may have seen her in productions for North Canton Playhouse and Canton Players Guild. She also took part in a weeklong internship with the cast of Jersey Boys at PlayhouseSquare — but missed the last day in order to audition for Idol. “I thought, ‘Oh, I’m sad … but I think it’s going to be worth it.’ And it was.”At the auditions in Pittsburgh, she said, “It was a long day but … it was a nice day out and there are a lot of people there. But there was a lot of singing, and I met a lot of cool people … people with such stories. I thought it was interesting that people had so many different backgrounds — musically and just growing up … but we all had the same dream.”Telecasts of the show leap from thousands of contenders to those few who get to sing for judges Randy Jackson, Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler. But the process involves several performances for producers and others leading up to the on-air judges, and Finefrock said she had to go through a couple of auditions before being called back for the final step.Then, for the big moment, she sang Duffy’s Syrup and Honey. “I like to think of myself as a bluesy-type, indie singer,” she said. “I sing a little bit of everything. But we’re a big fan of Duffy. Me and my mom listen to her all the time.” She also admires Ingrid Michaelson — and Johnny Cash, with Cash’s cover of Bob Dylan’s It Ain’t Me, Babe, a favorite.But the Duffy song was her choice for the audition and the judges “liked it a lot. They liked my voice,” she said.“Then Steven Tyler asked me to sing something else, so I sang I Want You Back by the Jackson 5. And they were a little concerned that I was only one type of singer because I didn’t give as strong a performance on my second song as on my first. It was just a wrong song choice. But they gave a lot of good feedback, and I’m just that much more excited to take what they had to say and put it to good use during Hollywood week.”The judges, she said, also “were funny. I heard them, they were trying to pronounce my last name, which can be kind of a mouthful.” (It looks like fine-frock but is pronounced fin-uh-frock.) “They were laughing when I came in, and were really down to earth. I really liked J-Lo. She was sweet and had a lot of nice things to say.”But, Finefrock said, “It was surreal. It was kind of weird seeing someone you’ve seen on TV all the time, right in front of your face.” Indeed, when asked how long she spent with the judges, she said, “I don’t really remember. … It was probably like only a couple of minutes, but it felt like an eternity.”Reaction to her getting this far has been good, she said, with lots of support from friends and family, and national attention thanks to the show’s posting videos of all the Hollywood contestants online. (See www.americanidol.com.) But where does she hope all this will lead?“I’m not a hundred percent sure,” she said. “I would love to go into musical theater, but I’m open to whatever God has planned for me. Just getting this far is such a blessing.”Rich Heldenfels writes about popular culture for the Beacon Journal and in the HeldenFiles Online blog at http://heldenfels.ohio.com. He is also on Facebook and Twitter. He can be reached at 330-996-3582 or rheldenfels@thebeaconjournal.com.