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Kelly Ripa: Snapshot

Name: Kelly Ripa
Date of Birth: October 02, 1970
Birth Place: Stratford, N.J.

With little on her acting resume except a TV teen dance gig, 19-year-old Jersey girl Kelly Ripa was tapped by ABC to play Pine Valley's Hayley Vaughan on All My Children. In 2001, the perky, self-deprecating personality charmed audiences of the morning chatfest Live with Regis, and was named cohost (opposite the beloved Regis Philbin) of the newly renamed Live with Regis and Kelly.

After juggling both shows for two years, the bubbly blonde left her 12-year gig with AMC and costarred on the ABC sitcom Hope & Faith for three seasons. Ripa, who now weighs 20 lbs. less than she did in high school, is often criticized for her thin frame, but credits her multi-tasking workload and her three children – with husband Mark Consuelos – for her physique.

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Kelly Ripa: Five Fun Facts

While hosting Saturday Night Live in 2003, the hyper Kelly Ripa joked that her hair-coloring product contained crack cocaine.
On Live in 2006, Kelly Ripa set a new Guinness World Record for "Most Custard Pies Thrown in One Minute (2 persons)" when she chucked 24 of the desserts at Wilmer Valderrama.
Kelly Ripa admits that cuticle-picking is her biggest vice. "If I point at something on camera, we get 80 faxes from people asking why I don't get a manicure," Ripa told USA Today in 2003. "People are so outraged by my hands."
Kelly Ripa said her first love was Robert Wagner, whom she adored on Hart to Hart. "And I mean, love," she told Redbook in 2006. "To the point where he would do shower scenes and I would peek down the front of the television set to see if he was really naked." Years later, Wagner played her father on Hope & Faith.
Kelly Ripa's rose/heart/wave tattoo on her left ankle is "a symbol of my youthful stupidity," she told the Los Angeles Times. She got it at 19 while at her first appearance for All My Children. "I had two hours to kill."

Kelly Ripa: Biography

1989: Heading to Pine Valley
Ripa attends Camden County College and performs in several local theatre productions. "My parents were adamant about college, so I took a few courses and then would audition for everything," Ripa tells the Los Angeles Times in 2001. "I took things like psychology, things I couldn't get motivated to do...My father is still waiting for me to go to college." After about two weeks, she drops out and moves to New York, where she lands the role of Hayley Vaughan (left), a troubled party girl, on the ABC soap All My Children.
1995: Meeting Mark
On the All My Children set, Ripa meets Mark Consuelos – newly hired to play her onscreen lover Mateo Santos (right). "When I met Mark, I was just sort of thunderstruck," she tells Redbook in 2007. "The next day I went up to him and, although I didn't even know his name, I said: 'I had a dream about you last night. We were married and had a little girl and were on a plane to Rome.'" Consuelos adds: "That was about as forthcoming as she was – and then she played hard to get." That summer, they begin dating in real-life.
1996: May 01
What Happens in Vegas...
After secretly dating for a year, Ripa and Consuelos elope in Las Vegas. "It just happened. The next thing you know, we're married, and then four months later we were pregnant," Consuelos tells Redbook. "It was a crazy way to get into a relationship." Ripa declares, "I've had a crush on my husband since the day I met him, and I'm so pleased that I still do all these years later." In June 1997, the newlyweds welcome their first son, Michael.