Cady McClain Looks Back at Her Very First Acting Job

Usually, it’s #ThrowbackThursdays, but soap hopper Cady McClain decided to throw all the way back to the beginning of her career on a Tuesday when she shared a screengrab on Instagram of herself in her very first acting role!

Although best known for playing Dixie on ALL MY CHILDREN, the talented actress has also starred as Rosanna on AS THE WORLD TURNS, Kelly on THE YOUNG & THE RESTLESS and Jennifer on DAYS OF OUR LIVES, racking up an impressive eight Daytime Emmy Award nominations and taking home the trophy three times, one each for AMC, ATWT, and DAYS!

“In 1979 I acted on an episode of LOU GRANT, a series starring Ed Asner about a newspaperman and his life,” McClain recalled. “In this episode, he went home to Oregon to remember why he was in the business of journalism. While he was there, he learned that the ‘paper boy’ was now the ‘paper girl.’ He was surprised but found it all right with him. I remember him as being a very nice man.”

McClain’s episode of LOU GRANT, titled “Hometown,” was the fourth episode of the fifth season of the dramatic spin-off of MARY TYLER MOORE and premiered on Nov. 23, 1981. In her scenes as Amy, the young actress exchanges dialogue with Asner’s Lou Grant when he tells her he used to do her old route and asks to buy one of the papers from her. And at the very end, Lou sees Amy riding her bike doing deliveries and urges her to hang in there.

“This was my first on-film acting job (other than commercials),” McClain revealed. “I recall having a nice time and eating some excellent pie. I always said I wasn’t ‘a natural’ when it came to acting. But when I saw this episode I realized that I was!

“Taking the opportunity to rethink the stories I’ve been telling myself,” she concluded. “Never too old to change the narrative.”