Thank you Matthew Rhys; or how I became a writer

I am not even sure if this memory is entirely accurate, but it is the one that stayed with me. I was watching German daytime TV sometime in 2012, half-distracted, not looking for anything in particular. Then an episode of Brothers and Sisters came on. I stayed on it at first because I recognised Sally Field. I had always liked her. And Balthazar Getty was in the scene too. Familiar names. Familiar faces. So I kept watching.

Only later did I learn that German television had not even aired the full show. Apparently only a couple of seasons made it onto daytime programming. What I saw that day was just a fragment, a small section of a larger story. Yet somehow that incomplete broadcast was enough to pull me in. By the end of the episode I was curious in a way I rarely am. I wanted more. I ordered the entire box set before I even understood why.

Something about the tone of the show lingered. And something about the way Matthew Rhys played Kevin Walker caught me by surprise. Sharp. Funny. Open. A little lost. A little too honest for his own good. He made me pay attention without trying. That is where the real shift began.

Back then IMDb still had discussion boards. It feels ancient now, like early internet archaeology. Tangled threads. Strange usernames. People gathering in messy little corners to talk about characters they cared about. In one of those corners someone had posted a link to a Kevin and Scotty fanfiction. I clicked it without expecting anything. I read it. And something inside me reacted, softly but unmistakably.

I realised that people were expanding stories that spoke to them. They were writing into emotional gaps. They were giving characters more space than television ever could. I had never seen anything like it so up close. And somehow, almost without intention, I slipped into that community. I commented. I read. I showed up. They welcomed me as if I had always been part of the group.

I read everything the writers there created. Every missing scene. Every imagined moment. Every alternative storyline. Their talent humbled me. It also inspired me. One night I had an idea for a story and wrote a short summary. I posted it, hoping someone else would turn it into something real. I was too unsure of myself to even imagine writing it.

The community had other plans.
They told me to do it myself.
If the idea had come to me, then I should be the one to develop it.

So I wrote it. Clumsily. Hesitantly. Nothing great. But it existed. That was the important part. That was the real beginning. Once I wrote the first piece, something inside me opened. The early 2010s were full of creative energy and I was suddenly part of it. LiveJournal became my home for a while, a place where writing was natural and constant and shared without fear.

Later I moved to Wattpad and shifted to original stories. I built new friendships there. One of them became my best friend. There were dramas of course because online communities are never simple. But there was also belonging. Meaningful conversations. Encouragement. When my best friend died in 2015 something in that world dimmed. I no longer felt the same connection to the platform. I slowly drifted away from it.
Eventually the blog became my only creative home. Quiet. Steady. Entirely mine. A place without noise or performance. A place where I could write because writing was part of my daily rhythm, not because anyone expected it.

Sometimes I hesitate to admit that I started with fanfiction. There is still a strange stigma attached to it. People assume it is not real writing. They are wrong. Some of the most powerful, emotional, well-crafted pieces I have ever read came from anonymous writers in those communities. That is where I learned voice, rhythm, confidence and the ability to write for the sake of creation itself.

And the truth is simple. My writing life began with one random episode on German TV. I stayed because of Sally Field and Balthazar Getty. I kept watching because something in the show hooked me. I ordered the box set because Matthew Rhys’s Kevin Walker felt too real to ignore. I found a community because I clicked on a single link in an old IMDb forum. I wrote my first story because kind strangers told me I could.
Everything since then grew from that quiet, accidental moment in 2012.

Bittersweet. Unexpected. Entirely mine. And thanks to Matthew Rhys.