I�ve watched As The World Turns since I was a kid.

Rose D�Angelo died on Friday. She was an evil twin. Not really although in soap terms that�s the most appropriate one. I never liked her sister Lily Snyder very much. Lily and I are the same age approximately. I�ve been watching Martha Byrne play Lily since adolescence. I�ve never had much patience for Lily.

But Rose D�Angelo, who showed up on the canvas about 4 years ago, I loved. Showgirl with a heart of gold. She was cut out of the bad girl mold, but she came across (in spite of several months of lies and impersonating her twin sister who was stranded on a desert island�) as more human than most bad girls- she wasn�t just ambitious or greedy, Martha Byrne made the trappings of a character who could have been cartoonish (very much so, being she was a New Jersey broad through and through) and made her vulnerable and tough- any way, I totally identified with Rose. Not like my other pet bad girls that I merely would sympathize and forgive for their bad girl activities (God Bless you Carly Tenney) but I really understood Rose. I felt like she represented me hugely. I totally loved her. Martha Byrne won an Emmy the year the character was introduced.

Rose�s storyline has been front burner lately, but nobody�s very happy with her. She got jilted at the altar because her fianc�e thought she spent the night with this other guy. She did but he was only consoling her for her discovery that it was her fianc�e who had recently threatened her life. He did this so he would have an excuse to hire a bodyguard to follow her everywhere. Rose decided to forgive her fianc�e, and marry him anyway. Since nothing happened between her and Dusty, she didn�t tell her fianc�e about the consoling. Unbeknownst to her, he�d peered through the window of her cottage and saw them in an embrace. He assumed the worst, and that�s why he jilted and public ally humiliated her. Right as he left the chapel she collapsed. She was poisoned. Of course, people have been making ominous statements for days in regard to Rose and what she deserves. There is more than one suspect. Her fianc�e is the main suspect. She died asking him �How could you do this to me?� as he was telling her that he leapt to conclusions and she couldn�t die, he loved her. He had found out, of course, that his worst assumption was untrue (Guess nobody told him about making an ass of u and me when he assumes�) Anyway.

I�ll miss Rose. I�ll miss her mistakes, her adventures, even her regrets. I need to make sure that part of me lives up to the showgirl in her. So in her honor, I�m going to try to be a little brasher, sparkle a little more, hastily say the wrong thing and laugh about it more often. I don�t have to try to love the wrong guys -that tribute is automatic.

See you at the Roller Palace D�Angelo. (That was the name of her beauty parlor. She wouldn�t let it be called a salon..) Keep your chin and your tits up.

Yes. I miss fictional characters. Not usually from TV. Try suing me for it.