Country singer Brett Young engaged to longtime girlfriend

Feb. 28 (UPI) -- Country singer Brett Young is engaged to be married.

The 36-year-old recording artist said in an interview with People that he proposed to longtime girlfriend Taylor Mills near his alma mater, University of Mississippi, this month.

"We met in Arizona while she was at school at [Arizona State University], and we will likely get married there, so I thought it would be romantic to propose where I went to school," Young explained of popping the question near Ole Miss.

"We are both more excited than we can express and looking forward to starting this chapter of our lives together," he said.

Young and Mills met over 10 years ago in Scottsdale, Ariz., and initially dated for six years. The couple took a break for "a few years" after Young moved to Nashville, but Mills remained in the singer's heart and mind.

"I wrote a lot of my first record about her," he said.

Young confirmed his engagement to Mills in an Instagram post Monday.

"SHE SAID YES!!!!" he wrote, adding heart eyes and engagement ring emojis. "#loveyoubabygirl."

Young is known for the singles "Sleep Without You," "In Case You Didn't Know" and "Like I Loved You," which appear on his debut studio album, Brett Young. The album debuted at No. 18 on the Billboard 200 in February 2017.