New Nina News: Five Fast Facts About General Hospital Star Cynthia Watros

General Hospital will be bidding goodbye to Michelle Stafford as Nina and welcoming soap veteran Cynthia Watros next week. While the award-winning actress may be familiar to some viewers, there are others who will be seeing her for the first time.

There is a lot to get to know about the new Nina. From her early beginnings to getting Lost, here are five fast facts everyone should know about Cynthia Watros.

In the Beginning
Watros was born on September 2, 1968, in Lake Orion, Michigan. Her parents divorced when she was seven and she has one older brother, Steven.

As a teen, she was diagnosed with immune thrombocytopenia, an autoimmune disease of the blood. She had to get a splenectomy and go through two years of chemotherapy.

Branching Out
She attended Macomb Community College in Macomb County, Michigan and then she finished her four-year degree to Boston University School for the Arts, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. In 1996, she married Curtis “Curt” Gilliland.

Soap Beginnings
In the 1990s, she played Annie Dutton on Guiding Light, winning a Daytime Emmy for Lead Actress in 1998. She also did some pinch-hitting as Vicky Hudson McKinnon on Another World when Jensen Buchanan was on maternity leave. It would be 15 years before she’d return to soaps as Kelly on The Young and the Restless in 2013.

In Her Prime
In between soap stints, Watros moved on to co-star on the primetime comedy Titus as the lead character’s girlfriend, Erin, for two seasons. During that time she was pregnant with her twin girls. From there, she did two seasons on The Drew Carey Show. After that, many primetime guest appearances followed.

Iconic Shows
Before long, she found herself on Lost, playing Libby on one of the most popular shows at the time from 2005-2010. She also had a seven-episode arc on House, and in 2014, she starred on the show Finding Carter with Alexis Denisof from Angel for two seasons.

General Hospital (GH) airs weekdays on ABC. Check your local listings for airtimes.