Mary J. Blige says controversy showed her who her true friends were.

Mary J Blige has apologized for singing about fried chicken in a Burger King commercial.

The 'Be Without You' singer acknowledged talk that she had wrongly portrayed African-American people by singing about her love of the food in the advert which was subsequently pulled.

She told radio station Hot 97's Angie Martinez: ''It was sold to us that I would be shot in an iconic way. I did it because I thought it was something that wouldn't come out like that.

''I would never just bust out singing about chicken and chicken wings.''

She continued: ''I want to apologize to everyone who was offended who thought I would do something that was so disrespectful to our culture. I would never do anything like that. I thought I was doing something right.''

Mary previously explained that the negative experience showed her who her true friends are.

She revealed: ''I understood the laughter and the jokes and the stuff that was happening - you're supposed to do that when something like that happens - but the thing that hurt me is when people were starting to say vicious, negative things that didn't have (anything) to do with that.

''It exposed everyone and everything in my life and showed me who my friends are.''

The fast food chain later apologized for the leaked advert after pulling it from its YouTube channel, citing a licensing issue.

© Bang Showbiz