Did you see the piece on 60 Minutes last night about the end of Guiding Light's 70-year run on CBS? This coming Friday the show will go dark after more than 15,700 episodes and 4,000 more radio shows. It's the longest running show on television and it played a HUGE role in my life as a teenager. What tried and true Guiding Light fan could forget Phillip, Beth, Mindy and Rick going to the prom in 1983? Or that Phillip and Beth's song was "Truly" by Lionel Richie? Who can forget the incredible character of Reva Shane, played by the peerless Kim Zimmer? Reva's love story with Josh Lewis was full of sigh-worthy moments that stayed with me years after I stopped watching the show. I'll never forget the evil Alan Spaulding, the delightful Lillian Raines, the scrappy Harley Cooper, the dependable Frank Cooper, the Bauers, Springfield itself...
My mother didn't want me watching the soaps when I was a young teenager, so I lived for Mondays—the day she bowled and I could gorge on Guiding Light in peace. However, she'd get home like clockwork at 3:50 p.m., meaning I missed the all-important last five minutes! (Good thing she never thought to check the heat coming from the TV!) I had to call a friend to find out what happened. Even watching once a week, I found I could keep up aided by the occasional flip through Soap Opera Digest in the drug store to fill in the missing blanks. In thinking about my mother forbidding me to watch, it occurred to me that I was allowed to watch Dallas and Falcon Crest. How funny is that? They were much worse than Guiding Light! My love of the soap probably played no small role in my later career as a romance writer!
Did you ever watch Guiding Light or any of the soaps? Are there characters you've never forgotten?
