Zoe Ball left her husband Norman Cook for a toyboy in his twenties because she found the superstar DJ boring, friends revealed yesterday.

She has walked out of the home she shared with Cook – the DJ Fatboy Slim – their son Woody, 16, and daughter Nelly May, six.

A source said: ‘Zoe told heartbroken Norman he was boring and said that she just wanted to drink and have sex with a new younger lover.’

White wedding: Zoe Ball married Norman Cook - aka DJ Fatboy Slim - in 1999

The 45-year-old TV presenter is living with her mother, Julia, in a house next door but one to the old marital home on the esplanade at Hove in East Sussex (pictured)

The couple have called the split the ‘end of our rainbow’ – a phrase that sings with romance. However, sources believe the separation is all about Miss Ball making a dignified exit.

The 45-year-old TV presenter moved out two weeks ago and is living with her mother, Julia, in a house next door but one to the old marital home on the esplanade at Hove in East Sussex.

The children are staying with Cook, 53.

On Saturday night, the couple tweeted: ‘With great sadness we are announcing that we have separated.

'After many exciting adventures together over the last 18 years we have come to the end of our rainbow.

‘We are still great friends and will continue to support each other and raise our beautiful children together, living next door but one.’

Solo: Norman was seen for the first time on Monday after announcing his split from wife Zoe Ball over the weekend

Day to day life: Norman was later seen leaving his gym in Hove, dressed in work out clothes

The television presenter was pictured kissing 22-year-old Tay Tay Starhz last year

Millionaires Row, near the Hove Western Esplanade and near Brighton in East Sussex

But a friend said: ‘In their most heated rows she has called him boring and said she wants more from her life. The decision came as a bolt out of the blue for Norman. He adores Zoe.’

The collapse of their marriage follows the embarrassing episode last year when Miss Ball was pictured ‘snogging’ a boyband singer, 20 years her junior, after a party in a nightclub.

She had, of course, left Cook previously, back in 2003, to set up home with another DJ before being persuaded back.

If true, the talk of a toyboy lover will surprise no one.

A friend said yesterday: ‘I think she gets bored.

‘She is always having flings and the marriage never really worked. I think they will be friends, though.’

Ladette: Ball with a cigarette and Jack Daniel's on the day of her wedding

Those close to the couple say Cook’s struggle with sobriety – he entered rehab in 2009 – was also a factor in the end of their marriage.

In order to support him, when he became teetotal she did, too.

He said afterwards: ‘We’ve grown closer since we’ve been sober. We’ve been to the mountain top and to the gutter and now we’re cruising for the rest of our lives.’

But, apparently, cruising lost its appeal for Miss Ball. She started drinking again in 2014, enjoying nights out with girlfriends and resuming a party lifestyle in London.

Cook, meanwhile, favoured daily workouts in the gym, and began training for half-marathons. Increasingly, their lives went in separate directions.

His wife has worked on the BBC2 Strictly Come Dancing spin-off show, It Takes Two, since 2011, which brings her to London five nights a week, with the inevitable temptations.

Outside Strictly season, she has a Radio 2 show and spends time with friends including former hellraiser DJ Sarah Cox in London.

She is loved by the Strictly ‘family’ who say she would ‘flirt with a chair’ but find her great company.

However, it appears that her feelings for Cook haven’t endured.

That boy: The collapse of their marriage follows the embarrassing episode last year when Zoe was pictured ‘snogging’ singer TayTay Starhz (pictured on Saturday) after a party

The couple have called the split the ‘end of our rainbow’ – a phrase that sings with romance. However, sources believe the separation is all about Miss Ball making a dignified exit

The source said: ‘Zoe packed her bags and left. They have been arguing a lot recently and she decided she’d had enough.

‘All the arguments have been over the same issue – Zoe wants to go out and have fun, and Norman would rather stay at home. His sobriety was hard-won and he doesn’t want to compromise it.

‘Zoe understands that, but she is in a very different place.

‘She loves a party and will get stuck into a night out.

‘Zoe and Norman are still talking, but the effort seems to be very much on his side. She is convinced the split will be permanent.’

One friend of Cook’s pointed out yesterday that one of the lessons he took out of rehab was that he should not hang out with anyone who was not sober too. Presumably, that came to include his wife.

Matters are said to have come to a head in August during a family holiday in Ibiza.

A source is quoted as saying: ‘There was a row about her drinking. Zoe doesn’t want to be sat on the sofa of an evening having a cup of tea.’

Not a care in the world: The Franklin Lake singer seemed non-plussed by the news of the Cook's split, as he was busy chatting to girls outside a club in Soho, London

So is this a midlife crisis for Zoe Ball – or is it simply a miracle that her marriage lasted so long?

The daughter of TV personality Johnny Ball, 78, was one of the original Nineties ‘ladettes’, famous for their wild behaviour, frequently pictured falling out of nightclubs.

Zoe doesn’t want to be sat on the sofa of an evening having a cup of tea

She fell hard for Cook after they met in Ibiza, and they married in 1999. But in 2003, they separated briefly when she met a DJ called Dan Peppe.

Miss Ball claimed her husband’s drinking was as much a part of the problem as her affair. She said that leaving Cook was about getting ‘away from the chaos’.

In 2009, they both became teetotal. All seemed well, but in 2014, she began partying again, her ‘ladette’ behaviour, endearing in the Nineties, now a little unsavoury for a mother in her forties.

Then, last December, came the kiss with boyband member Tay Tay Starhz, 22.

Neither she nor Cook ever commented on that episode.

Perhaps Miss Ball dropped a hint when she revealed that he wanted his gravestone to read: ‘Norman was a very patient man.’

Even patience was not enough. And now she is at the end of the rainbow – and a free agent again.

Miss Ball did not respond to requests for comment last night.