Kelley Missal

BIRTHDATE: October 25
HAILS FROM: Central New Jersey
YEARS ON SHOW: October 2009-present

With little TV experience and no knowledge of the soap opera genre, Kelley Missal burst onto the scene last fall as Todd and Téa's tough-cookie love child, Danielle Rayburn, on ONE LIFE TO LIVE. Growing up in a family of performers, Missal says she always had a thirst for the spotlight. "It was kind of a secret dream," she tells Soap Opera Digest. "No one actually knew that I wanted it so bad, but in my heart I just wanted an opportunity to show people I can do this and I can become better at it."

Missal credits her parents with allowing her to pursue her dream ("My mom and dad support me 100 percent of the way," she praises) and OLTL co-stars Eddie Alderson (Matthew), Florencia Lozano (Téa) and Trevor St. John (Todd) with helping her grow. "Working with everyone has been a great learning experience … their different acting techniques and how they play the scenes and just growing off of that and feeding off each individual person's energy."

Prior to landing the part of Dani, Missal appeared in a SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE sketch with Dan Aykroyd and Jimmy Fallon as a "little Irish orphan". Now that she's playing the daughter of Llanview's worst dad, she's thriving on the drama. "When I started to see the scripts and read their scenes, I realized, 'Oh, my goodness. This girl is a mixture of two cuh-razy characters,' " she laughs. "There's so much drama all the time, but I love it!"