Which Soaps Divined you Childhood?

[Cat]

My first obsession was Dynasty. I was only a young kid (like, 8) but I had the Dynasty book and everything. I adored that show.

Daytime-wise, Santa Barbara, Days of our Lives (and a little later B&B ) defined my middle school years. I will always regret not having gotten into AW until after it was cancelled. I would have given everything to watch it when it aired.

After SB was cancelled, I added Y&R and GH to my soap watching. And when I was in my early 20s, I was all about Sunset Beach.

[BKuzak]

That makes me think of my grandmother. When we could talk on the phone regularly, she would be telling me about either AMC or Another World. of course she would get the names all mixed up and tell me Cass and Erica were having an affair or Grant tried to kill Myrtle. LOL. she loved them both though. After AW ended, i was able to get her to watch One Life To Live.

[Khan]

LOL! Say, don't we have a thread floating around here where we imagined characters from different soaps meeting and even hooking up? That's what your statement reminds me of.

[EricMontreal22]

I know it's a typo, but the title of this thread cracks me up. Make it sound like the soaps were sent to us by God.

I think everyone knows my story. But... Around the Summer of 1991 my sister had a friend whow as staying with us for a few weeks, and had watched AMC with her mom, so they would watch it (my sister and her.) I was a snobby little creep back then (yes, at age 11) and thought soaps were complete trash--I think I would watch them when sick sometimes but find them so confusing I just wrote them off, and my family never watched soaps (though my grandma later told me how much she loved Guiding Light and Ma Perkins on the radio.) So there was a slight stigma I guess that Iatched on to.

But I would sorta secretly watch. Then I was sick a lot that Fall with Pneumonia and became completely hooked. By the Natalie in the Well stuff (Thanksgiving?) I was taping it every day and would go to the library to find every book on soaps I could (luckily they had a copy of All Her Children ). So all that stuff, the big introduction of the Marricks, Angelique in the attic, Helga, the Edmund paternity stuff--that gothic stuff really hooked me, but I also got into the Who Shot Will story Spring 92 or so. I also had the rather snobby attitude (though I admit a part of me still considers this) that overall AMC was simply the best soap, and though I would check out others when I was home sick (I quite liked Guiding Light--I think partly as I had read it was the oldest soap) I thought that was enough for me.

Then in '92 I guess late Spring was the AMC/Loving cross over with Carter. I had never even HEARD of Loving--I would bug my mom to buy SOD when she could, but they barely covered it--but they did mention the crossover. So I taped that and just stuck with it. And around the same time, when I was home sick, I happened upon OLTL's Billy Douglas gay teen story which, for now obvious reasons, hooked me, though I would make sure to watch it when my parents weren't around. So by Fall 92 I was taping all three shows (my mom would watch AMC with me and got somewhat hooked, but I think my parents were a bit upset thatm, even with fast forwarding, I was watching about two hours of soaps every day. Still, my sister was acting up with booze, my brother was having his own issues, so I was the leastof their concerns.)

I basically stuck with those shows (and the snob in me loved that Agnes Nixon created them all) through until The City ended. Around that time I finally had a heavy social life and got involved in acting in a lot of local theatre, so I basically cut down to just AMC (I had no interest in PC, as it stole The City from me and OLTL had become that muddled mess it was for much of the late 90s and while I'd watch if I was home I was losing some interest. Although one good thing about The City ending was Daytime to Remember--this was before youtube and it was absolutely *mind blowing* to see these old episodes. I believe I actually would skip one of my classes before lunch to run home to watch them live.)

Other soaps came and went but AMC has always been "home" for me, closely followed by OLTL (though if Loving had stuck around it may have come in as second--I kinda liked the fact it was this little show that got no love lol.) The only time I fell behind on AMC was around 2001--it was during Passanante's awful era anyway--when I first moved to Montreal for school and had no tv--and this was still before onlive videos. I would catch a few episodes each month at a sympathetic friend's (though he would mock me each time--although he became more and more into it) and keep up with the online summaries till I finally got a tv.

I did follow GH at times--like the AIDS storyline which terrified but moved me, but I really didn't have time to watch another soap--and besides, Iwould think, it's not an Agnes soap and it's not even filmed in New York like "true" soaps. GL, AW and ATWT also always interested me, but I'd only watch them when I was home sick. I did like Sunset Beach quite a bit--it seemed a fun parody of soap operas, though Passions which I gave a very honest try with was just too slow and awfully repetitive to stay with. By then I had started on soap message boards, so became much more aware of what was happening on other shows.

[juniorz1]

For me, it started with my weaseling out of naptime in order to watch Days of our Lives, Another World, and Texas with my mother. Days was my first love, as it was the early 80s and we were in the heydey of the DiMeras, the Salem Slasher, Maggie/Don/Liz, and Doug & Julie were still a very permanent fixture.

However, when I discovered Santa Barbara in October 1985 (when Gina pulled the plug on CC's life support and framed Eden for it), I was entranced. I resisted at first because it was on at the same time as my cartoons but when that storyline started, I fell in love with the show and Cruz & Eden. Thank God I did because I then got to witness firsthand my all-time favorite soap quad, Santana/Cruz/Eden/Kirk, Mary & Mason's sweet romance and her shocking death on the Capwell Hotel rooftop via the Giant "C," Eden & Kirk's epic showdown in Aqualand, and my all-time favorite soap storyline, Gina and The Tape (that proved Kelly only killed Dylan in self-defense). Not before, or since, did a soap hook me like that.

I will say I became enthralled with Another World when Anne Heche came on, though I remember always loving Anna Stuart's Donna and Nancy Frangione's Cecile whenever they paid visits. It saddens me how far away AW got from the wonderful characters of the 80s as the 90s wore on. I LOVED the original MJ (Kathleen Layman), Kathleen, Larry & Clarice, Catlin & Sally, Adam Cory, Mitch Blake- all characters who would never return.

I also got to watch the tail-end couple years of Search For Tomorrow and fell in love with my Sonni Adamson, thanks to my Grandmother watching. She was so sad to see SFT (and Jo & Stu) go off the airwaves in 1986.

But then, she got into a little soap that nobody watched called Loving in 1987 and I immediately got hooked on that one, so much so that I'd even watch it when she wasn't babysitting me (my mom watched SFT but didn't get into Loving, so it was a challenge). I LOVED me some Jack & Lily and the Stacey/Jack/Lily triangle (I always HATED Stacey Forbes). Of course, I fell in love with Steve & Trisha and was saddened (and shocked!) when Steve was shot dead at their wedding. I also had the pleasure of watching Christine Tudor's Gwen (and the vastly underrated Elizabeth Savage, whom I also adored). Not to mention meeting the gorgeous Luke Perry for the first time as Ned Bates and having the pleasure of being able to detest Alexandra Wilson (as April) before she ever showed up on AW as Josie. And the wonderful relationship between Nada Rowland's Kate Rescott and the incomparable Roya Megnott as her daughter Ava. I still adore their relationship to this day. I watched all the way until 1992, when I moved to St. Louis and they didn't air Loving. I then could only watch during the summers in Niagara Falls.

I may never had grown to accept Lisa Peluso as Ava had my Grandmother not loved her so much from her memories of her as Wendy Wilkins on SFT. Her love for her made me love her. But Noelle Beck's Trisha was my favorite and I HATED when they tried pairing her with Jeff when Steve died. Thank God Trucker came on (HUGE soap crush on Robert Tyler) and they turned Jeff into a psycho. Jeff's kidnapping of Trisha was AH-MA-ZING!!!

After SB went off the air, Y&R became my new soap obsession and I'm SO glad I got to watch Bill Bell's sumptuous storytelling in the 90s. I also took up B&B (the Brooke/Ridge/Taylor story got me started, but Brooke and BeLIEF got me HOOKED) and AMC. I even tuned into OLTL briefly in the mid-90s when AW had a stale year or 2 before JFP showed up (I got back into OLTL shortly after JFP's arrival there- I'm a JFP fanboy, what can I say?).

But my soap lineup of SFT/DAYS/AW/SB and later, LOV/DAYS/AW/SB was as close to perfection as a soap lineup ever was for me.

[JtSmarts]

The soaps that defined by childhood were Dool and GL, and to a lesser extent AW. Passions took AW's spot during my teen years. I always watched Dool with my grandmother and my uncles.. They loved Victor and Kate and I was the only Sami fan, and I would always hide it from them lol. My grandmother and I would also always watch GL together. She was a huge Reva and Josh fan, and would always tell me no matter what, Reva and Josh always would get back together.

[Cat]

juniorz, I loved Roya Mengot as Ava on Loving. Fun, capricious, spoiled, diva... just all-around fabulousity.

[KMan101]

I was a teen for DAYS in the mid 90s so I guess I'd go with that. DAYS has been 'the' show for me since before highschool so ... I can't believe I've watched something for nearly 20 years. LOL. But to be fair, the ABC soaps defined my childhood. My Aunt, Grandma and Mom all watched. So they hold a very special place. It was also nice to attend Super Soap Weekend with my Mom. The little things in life Appreciate them