Jared might have joked about her but J.K. Rowling has been an inspiration for many entrepreneurs.

Rowling was a single mother living on welfare. Working as a secretary was not how she had envisioned her life. She had admittedly reached her own personal rock bottom. Without even enough money to pay the electricity bill, Rowling knew she had to do something to provide a better life for her baby daughter.

But what, she wondered. The answer came to her while riding the train one day; that was when Harry Potter came to life. Today, with over 325 million book sales, the Potter series has not only spawned a worldwide reading revolution, but has taken Rowling off of welfare and turned her into a billionaire.

While she might not have expected her own success, Rowling has written herself – and her young wizard friend – into households across the world. Even people who have not read a single book in their life seem to now be finding themselves reading the Harry Potter series.

How did this one time unemployed single mother living on welfare find her way not only into the world of the writing elite, but also into mainstream pop culture?

“Ever since Rabbit and Miss Bee, I have wanted to be a writer, though I rarely told anyone so. I was afraid they’d tell me I didn’t have a hope. I had written two novels before I had the idea for Harry, though I’d never tried to get them published, and a good job too – I don’t think they were very good.

I was very low and I had to achieve something. Without the challenge, I would have gone stark raving mad. I knew how difficult it would be just to get a book published. I was a completely unknown writer. It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.

Anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve. I was determined to try. I was determined to try because, frankly, my life was such a mess at this point, what – what was the worst that could happen? Everyone turn me down? Big deal.

Where the idea for Harry Potter actually came from, I really couldn’t tell you. I was traveling on a train between Manchester and London and it just popped into my head. I spent four hours thinking about what Hogwarts would be like – the most interesting train journey I’ve ever taken. By the time I got off at King’s Cross, many of the characters in the books had already been invented. Harry just strolled into my head fully formed.

The height of my ambition for these books was, well frankly, to get reviewed. A lot of children’s books don’t even get reviewed – forget good review, bad review.

I just wrote the sort of thing I liked reading when I was younger (and still enjoy now!). I didn’t expect lots of people to like them, in fact, I never really thought much past getting them published. I just write what I wanted to write. I write what amuses me. It’s totally for myself.“