Rick Springfield explains who is 'Jessie's Girl?'

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The real story behind Rick Springfield's 'Jessie's Girl'

Fox411's Story Behind the Song: Rick Springfield shares the origin story to his hit song 'Jessie's Girl'

NEW YORK – When the first chord of the iconic love song “Jessie’s Girl” by Rick Springfield is played, fans immediately get excited and ready to jam -- a feeling that Springfield only dreamed about until his smash hit was performed live. The question on all of our minds is “Who is Jessie’s Girl?” Springfield shared the unrequited love story that inspired the song that the whole world has fallen in love with.

“I was kind of between record deals in 1979 and I basically was pretty sure I wasn't going to get another record deal; I'd had three failed records and I was kind of looking-- maybe my mom was right maybe I need something to fall back on,” Springfield told FOX411.

The singer said he loved to work creatively with his hands so he signed up for a stained glass class after admiring the glass work in churches.

“This girl was at the class and she was just....you know, burning.” Unfortunately for Rick, the woman had a boyfriend and wanted nothing to do with him, despite his confidence that he could change her mind.

“So I took my sexual angst home and started writing a song about it.”

The boyfriend’s name was Gary, but Springfield said that name didn’t work well in the song, so he changed it to Jessie—inspired by a 1979 LA Rams, Ron Jessie T-shirt that Springfield owned. “I was wearing his shirt that I had just picked up at a market that said Jessie on the back and it was spelt J-E-S-S-I-E which is a female. I meant to spell it J-E-S-S-E but the rest is kind of history.”

Sadly, the object of Springfield's affection never knew she was “Jessie’s girl,” despite Oprah’s efforts in trying to track down the women behind the song for an episode of her show.

“They actually found the stained glass class that I had gone to," the singer explained. "The guy had died two years before and they had thrown all his paperwork out a year after that, so they missed her by a year, but I'd recognize her if I saw her. I mean I still remember in my head what she looked like."