[Python] fetchall() returns a list of lists instead of a list

This is, I'm sure, a very basic SQL question, but I've been unable to determine the cause/solution.

I have Python code that queries a DB to return a list of categories:

category_query = "SELECT cat_name FROM categories"
cursor = mydb.cursor()
cursor.execute(category_query)
result = cursor.fetchall()


The result, when printed from Python code, is:

[('blob',), ('Clothes',), ('Decorating',), ('Dolls',), ('Household',), ('Kids',), ('Kitchen',), ('Office',), ('Uncategorized',)]


What I was expecting was:

[('blob'), ('Clothes'), ('Decorating'), ('Dolls'), ('Household'), ('Kids'), ('Kitchen'), ('Office'), ('Uncategorized')]


This is easy enough to "fix" by iterating through the results and turning them into a list

cat_list = []
for i in categories:
cat_list.append(i[0])
categories = cat_list`


but I'd rather understand why I'm getting this result and how to rewrite the query so that it returns a list instead of a list of lists.

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