Terri Conn Looks Back at Katie and Simon’s Epic Romance on AS THE WORLD TURNS (EXCLUSIVE)

They say that it’s difficult to get over your first love — and that was certainly true for AS THE WORLD TURNS’ Katie. “She lost her virginity to Simon in a garage, in the back seat of a vintage car,” her portrayer, Terri Conn, recalled to Soaps In Depth. “We were all dressed up in flapper clothes for a ’20s-themed ball or something, and we’d had too much to drink.”

As the couple’s relationship evolved, Conn and leading man Paul Leyden got to play a lot of fantasy scenes. “It was so much fun getting to wear wigs and period pieces,” she shared. “Paul and I just loved it and hopped right in!”

Viewers loved the couple together, too, even though the characters didn’t always get along. “He didn’t actually want to be with her at the beginning,” Conn recalled, “but they fit together despite his best efforts not to.” From Katie’s perspective, the bad boy was simply impossible to ignore. “I mean, that accent, you know? You can’t not love that! And it was so much thicker at the beginning or after he would return from visiting Australia.’”

The chemistry between Conn and Leyden fueled the comedy that often accompanied their characters’ action scenes. The actress recalled that “the fans could feel it and wanted to be part of the fun.” Among her favorite memories is when the sparks really flew at a most unexpected time. Speaking in character, Conn reflected, “I was kidnapped in Malta at an opera, and we were both tied together — he had to get the key or something from my bra, and it was a very sensual scene.”

At least until things turned on a dime! “There were bad guys with guns because of Simon’s past [as a con man]… He thought, ‘I never fall in love because I can’t have a weakness’ — he was like a 007 — and that’s why it was so fun to watch him want to give up that life for love.”

At one point, Simon even married Katie to avoid being deported, but as she learned the hard way, he had a habit of going on walkabout. “He was tough to hold down… he was too much of a bird to keep in a cage, and she wasn’t adventurous enough to take off with him,” Conn suggested, adding that being raised on the road with her singer mom made Katie desperate for the comforts of home. “She’d never really had roots, so she was desperate for them.”

For more memories from your favorite ATWT stars, keep reading the CBS edition of Soaps In Depth magazine.

This story originally appeared in our print magazine