General Hospital has been my favorite soap for almost 20 years. I can't
believe how fast the time has gone!
I started watching GH in 1984. I was a college student at the time and I
never watched daytime soaps regularly. I had watched a few for a short
time in the early 70´s when I was a kid, and I watched the primetime soaps
like Dallas and Knots Landing.
That summer, my husband and I were in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He had to
complete some training for graduate school that is given there every year.
I was just out of school for the summer and working to make ends meet. We
didn't have much money then. We rented a small place that university
subsidized. Most of our regular stuff was in New York where we were going
to school.
My husband was at school during the day and I worked at night at a fast
food place. During the day, I was in the apartment alone and bored. We had
a small TV set so I just watched whatever was on, mostly reruns. I started
watching Santa Barbara, which started then, and General Hospital. The
Olympics were on ABC that year, so they showed 20-minute versions of the
soaps. I guess that combination of things got me interested, and soon I
was hooked!
When we went back to New York, I couldn't watch the soaps during the day
because I was at school. We didn't have a car so I couldn't just zip home
during lunch to watch them. I soon found out that the student center had a
TV room where people gathered to watch the soaps! So I started going there
to watch GH (it was on at 3pm and I seldom had classes during that time).
I met some friends there and we started watching together, and meeting up
to talk about the soaps and to make comments. This was even better because
it's always more fun to watch with other people. I had to stop watching
Santa Barbara, though, because they only watched the ABC soaps in the TV
room and they wouldn't allowed you to change the channel.
Soon I started getting really hooked so I would try to rush over from my
class to make sure I didn't miss the beginning of the show (or sometimes I
had no class the hour before, even better). What that meant, was that I
would catch the end of One Life to Live. Pretty soon I was hooked on that
one, too, although I never liked it as much as GH.
In the following year or so, I was visiting relatives for the summer or
Christmas vacation, not sure which…when I started watching All My
Children, because it came on before OLTL. This was becoming a serious
addiction! Still, GH remained my favorite.
We moved to El Paso a few years later…my husband got a job but I still had
one year left of school. In the TV room there (apparently every college
has one), they watched The Young and the Restless, and then switched it
half-way through to All My Children. A friend that I met in a class came
there sometimes to watch Y&R and AMC. So guess what I started doing?
That's right, I started watching Y&R.
A couple of years later, I got my first VCR so I could start recording the
soaps and other shows. I started watching the new soap "Generations" and
got hooked on it as well. Eventually I got a second VCR so I could make
sure to get the shows when they conflicted.
Flash forward to 1991. I was not working and I didn't know a lot of people
where we lived, and I didn't have any friends. So I started watching more
soaps (probably not the healthiest thing in the world). I picked up Santa
Barbara again and added Days of Our Lives. Eventually, Santa Barbara and
Generations were canceled. So I added The Bold and The Beautiful. At some
point I got another job and had to quit watching B&B because it was just
too difficult to watch so many and still watch primetime shows.
I got a job working at home a few years later, and so I was able to watch
whatever I wanted. I added Another World and Sunset Beach to the roster.
Eventually, both were canceled, but I started watching Passions and then
Port Charles, when they started.
I started a big web page about TV, especially the soaps, in 95. I started
with GH, naturally. Now it's very successful, but it's a big job. Twice
now I have flown to L.A. to see the GH and PC stars at their fan events.
So now I feel like I know some of the actors.
A year ago, I got digital cable, so I was able to see Soapnet. Now I could
easily tape/watch the abc soaps any time I wanted. The videotapes really
stack up, especially when I go on vacation and have someone tape the shows
for me. I know I have at least 6 months worth of soap opera videos lying
around, at least.
I am not working now and might not get another job because of where we
live. I have been taping Y&R, Days, and Passions, and watching the ABC
soaps. I am usually behind on at least two of the shows. Because I have a
soap opera page, I wanted to know more about the other soaps, so recently
I started watching the rest of the soaps: B&B, As the World Turns, and
Guiding Light. They are actually pretty good. GH is still my favorite,
though.
