Kirsty Roberts (pictured) is feeling ten foot taller after pioneering surgery.

For the Abertillery teenager has grown four inches after undergoing an operation in a French hospital to lengthen her legs.

Kirsty, who is 16, has just returned from a three-month hospital stay in Nancy and says the operation was a success.

As the Argus revealed earlier this year, she has a rare genetic disorder which retards her growth. She was just four feet two inches before leaving for the operation in July.

Now she has grown to four foot six inches - and should shoot up another four inches by January.

Kirsty, of Llwyn-Onn Road, told the Argus yesterday that she was delighted with her new height and can now reach light switches in her home - something she could not manage before.

"It is all quite new to me but everything went well and I am still growing about one millimetre a day," she said yesterday.

Kirsty, who will return to St Alban RC School in Pontypool next September to do her A-levels, says she will be undertaking a secretarial or computer course at Ebbw Vale College to keep herself busy in the meantime.

Her mother Kay added that her daughter had been extremely brave during their time in France.

"There were three of them having the same operation and Kirsty was the youngest - but she was the leader of the pack," she said.