HELLO, LARRY!

Ed Fry returns to As The World Turns as Dr. Larry McDermott and gives his daughter Alison a shock beginning on Monday, May 25.

Dr. Larry came to Oakdale in 1990. His official reason was a job at Memorial Hospital. His less official reason was a desire to reconnect with old girlfriend Frannie Hughes. Frannie wasn't interested, so Larry moved on to his first Oakdale older woman -- Lyla Peretti. (Lyla had just been widowed by the younger Casey Peretti.) Larry's blowhard dad, LJ, wasn't thrilled by his boy's involvement with a Grandma (Cricket, Craig and Margo all had kids by then), and the relationship eventually fizzled.

LJ was even less thrilled with Larry's next love, Susan Stewart (and he was just concerned about her age, not about her less that sterling past). Susan may have been no Grandma (she'd barely been a mom to Emily growing up), but she also could no longer have more children.

Larry reassured Susan that it didn't matter. She was enough for him. Susan wasn't convinced. Seeing her mother's insecurity, Emily volunteered to donate an egg so that Susan could give birth to Larry's child. Alison is the result.

When Larry got a job in Chicago, Susan and Alison made plans to move with him. But Emily pulled some strings to make sure her mother's job fell through and Alison remained in Oakdale. Susan and Larry tried to carry on a long-distance relationship, but when Larry had an affair, Susan filed for divorce.

Having had almost no contact with her father, Alison changed her name to Stewart -- the name of her mother's ex-husband.

Lest anyone think such a thing could never happen in the real world, you might be interested to learn that actress Sara Gilbert is the daughter of Melissa (Little House on the Prairie) Gilbert's mother and her second husband, Harold Abeles. She changed her name to Gilbert (after her mother's ex-husband) in order to further her acting career.

So see, soaps aren't that out there, after all!