Melissa Reeves, who last appeared onscreen back in 2021, is bringing her beloved alter-ego back to Days of our Lives just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday and to join in the mourning for Doug Williams (who played the late, great Bill Hayes).

Melissa Reeves IN At DAYS

“I heard about Bill, which was just devastating for all of us,” Reeves relayed to TV Insider. “I was like, ‘I wonder if they’re going to do tribute shows.’ Matt [Ashford, Jack Deveraux] and I always keep in touch and Matt said, ‘Would you ever think about going back?’ And I said, ‘Matt, I think about DAYS all the time.’ Days of our Lives was where I grew up and spent my life, really, from 18 until now. So it always has a place in my heart and it always will for me and for my family. So I said, ‘Matt, you know if they called, I would say yes, but I haven’t heard anything.’”

The call came soon enough, and Reeves suddenly found herself in the unenviable position of re-immersing herself into the rigors of daytime TV production: “I came in a day early. I just needed a day to be here and wrap my brain around going to work again and being on set again. It’s been a couple of years. People make that joke, it’s like riding a bike, but that’s what it feels like. I feel prepared and I was laughing to Scott, ‘Honey, I have to put on some high-heeled shoes and walk around this house and get my calf muscles used to it again.’ I have not worn high heels in so many years. On the farm, I wear muck boots all day.”

The actress was gladdened by the opportunity to pay tribute to Hayes: “Of course I cried [at the news of his passing] because he’s such an incredible man, but what an incredible legacy he has left behind as a man, as a father, as a grandfather, as a husband. That’s what you want to leave behind when you go, people speaking so well of you.”

And as for whether or not she’d be open to sticking around: “I joined this show at 18 years old and that became my family because I didn’t have a healthy family. I think throughout your life, that’s always what you’re striving to have, this closeness and this community together and I always feel that when I’m there. I told Matt, ‘I would even come back full time but the problem is, I don’t have a place to stay anymore.’ I always had family in Los Angeles but all the Reeveses have moved to Tennessee!”

Are you pleased to hear that Jennifer Rose Horton will be back on the scene before year’s end? Let us know in the comments section below.

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