Selena Gomez is proud of her connection to legendary Tejano singer Selena Quintanilla and is hoping to spend her career building on the distinction.

"My dad and mom were huge fans," Gomez recently shared of how she came to have her first name. "My name was going to be Priscilla, but my cousin actually took the name when she was born six months before me. They actually loved [Selena's] music, so they just named me after her."

The "Hands To Myself" singer was born just a few years before Selena's death and has long made it a point of publicly showing her love and respect for her.

Gomez has Long Paid Homage to Quintanilla

"I grew up and I went to her grave, I got to go to her house," she said. "It was really crazy. And then when I started working, I remember I got to meet her family and I just got super emotional cause it's so crazy to see how far everything . . . I don't know, like where she'd be right now. It's nuts."

It's been 21 years now since Quintanilla was murdered while working on her eighth album. Since that time, Gomez has prided herself on becoming known for being as dedicated as her namesake was and for working just as hard as she did.

Gomez Has No Regrets About Being a Child Star

She recently told GQ magazine she has no regrets about being cast in the spotlight at such an early age.

"I chose this," the now 23-year-old "Come Get It" singer recently shared. "So I'm not gonna sit here and say, 'Oh, my God, poor me. I didn't have a normal childhood.' I don't give a f--k about that."

Still, Gomez reflected she sometimes feels sorry for those who have sought to walk in her shoes.

"We're easy targets," she said of young child stars. "Every single kid who was brought up like this is an easy target. It's disgusting, because it's interesting to grown adults that these kids go through weird things because they're figuring out, 'Do I like this? Do I love this?'"

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