daytime TV

Bill and Susan Hayes

Bill Thompson

If you were a regular viewer of NBC’s popular soap opera Days of Our Lives in the 1970s and 80s, you know instantly who I’m talking about when I simply say Doug and Julie.

Actress Susan Seaforth joined the cast in 1968, followed by Bill Hayes two years later. And 4 years after that, their on-screen romance turned into reality, when they married in real life.

And while Bill and Susan Hayes have lived happily ever after, unfortunately the same was not true for Doug and Julie. Oh yes, they suffered the usual soap opera tribulations, but then in the mid-1980s, MBC decided to take it soap operas – including Days of Our Lives – in a new, much younger Direction.

Doug and Julie – I mean, Bill and Susan Hayes – were fired.

I met them in 2006, when they wrote a dual autobiography called like Sands Through The Hourglass.

So here now, from 2006, Bill and Susan Hayes.

Bill Hayes is 96 now. Susan Seaforth Hayes is 78. And both still appear from time to time on Days of Our Lives.

Wendy Williams

Bill Thompson

Every day millions of American TV viewers tune in to the syndicated Wendy WIlliams Show.

Wendy Williams in 2003

She’s been a fixture on daytime TV since 2008. But her media career began long before that.

Some have even called her a “shock jockette”.

When I met her in 2003, Williams was a major radio personality but had not yet broken out onto the national stage in a major way. She had just written her first book, Wendy’s Got The Heat.

So here now, from 2003, Wendy Williams.

Wendy Williams is 56 now. Her TV show is now in its 13th year, she has written several books, she has a line of fashions, wigs, and jewelry.