What I mean by this is that I was raised on Neighbours from birth, one of my first memories is the 1994 season finale. And also Home and Away. I have strong memories of Tiffany's death when I was not even 10. My (immediate) family on and off watched these soaps when I was growing up. Admittedly my nanny watched Emmerdale (but I didn't sit there and watch it with her until I was over 10).

So my question is, are we influenced by the soaps our parents watched? Or are there many of you for example who never watched Neighbours but decided when you were 25 to watch it, and became addicted?

I definitely was. My whole family watched Coronation Street and it has stuck with me ever since.

But since then I've watched EE and ED just because I was interested, and I drop in and out to this day.

I have periods of watching EE and H&A on and off, but for some reason I never shake Neighbours no matter how crap it is. It's like my comfort zone I don't know from having it there right when I was a baby.

I really want to like ED, HO and Corrie but I can't do it

We had every soap going on in our house

Neighbours
Home and Away
EastEnders
Dallas
Coronation Street
Brookside
Emmerdale
Sons and Daughters
Family Affairs
Shortland Street
A Country Practice
The Flying Doctors
Blue Heelers
Take The High Road
Doctors

Poor dad never got a look in.

The only soap I watch these days is EastEnders. But I do have a love for stories, always have done. Plus I'm a bit of a gossip. Did they influence me?

Probably.

It's funny though, both me and my sister who were introduced to soaps at an early age are both very grounded, stable people. My cousins who were never allowed to watch soaps became Delinquents.

I can relate to this, having a programme that's on at set times every week is in fact comforting, especially if you're going through a tough time.

You'd also have no time watching all 6 regularly!

Yes. My mum is to blame for getting me totally addicted on soaps! She had them on all the time. Neighbours was the first soap she got me into as it was on at lunchtime and it was before I started school.

Most of my soap viewing takes place on night shifts

That's very interesting to know. I definitely think 90s Neighbours gave me a moral compass

Yeah I was an avid viewer in the 90s, especially when the kennedys arrived. I stopped watching when I started working full time in the early 00s. Did get back into it a couple of years ago but soon fell behind.

I was definitely. I remember my mom watching All My Children and One Life to Live when I was really little, then one summer I had salmonella and spent the whole summer in the house with nothing to do so I started watching the soaps myself. She was not happy about it though, she felt they were in appropriate for a kid my age. But she gave in and let me continue watching them when she discovered I was taping them while I was in school.

Love this

As I was already 27 when Neighbours, the only soap I now regularly watch, started and I didn't really get into it for another couple of years I'd have to say no. Mum faithfully watched Coronation Street and Emmerdale Farm (as it then was) from the first episodes and they haven't stuck with me at all. We did used to watch the Australian lunchtime shows though, eg. The Sullivans, and Sons and Daughters started while I was living at home for a brief period so maybe that's where I got the taste for Down Under Drama (loved Winners & Losers!)

Most underrated show of all time IMO

Definitely. When I was born, we only had 5 channels and ny family used to watch EE. I loved it and became addicted very quickly. I remember Tiffany falling down the stairs and I was a toddler then. My family are more casual viewers, but I am still die hard, even though I am the youngest and started watching last!

One of my earliest memories is of the plaintive tones of the Coronation Street intro theme. I didn't like it because it was the signal for bedtime. However when old enough to stay up I did watch and continued to do so until it got silly (overly dramatic).

I have listened to the Archers arguably since before I was born and certainly my MUm used to put the radio in my pram when she took me for an afternoon walk. I still listen to this day.

Coronation Street was always on in my house, my mum loved it, my dad hated it (he went off to the pub ) I grew up in a British expat family in NZ and Corrie was the only British soap on, I s'pose it was our British traditions that we wanted to keep up.

My earliest memories of Corrie were probably the mid 90s with Curly and Reg etc. I can remember more clearly when the Battersby's arrived in '97.

I started watching Home and Away on my on accord in about 2000ish (when the Sutherlands arrived) at the age of 10/11, I watched it for about 15 years before giving up a year or so ago.

I wasn't born into soaps. I started watching Neighbours not long after it started (almost a teenager) and I instantly took to it. The same with EastEnders. I started watching Emmerdale about a couple of months ago and instantly took to that as well. I didn't bother with TV much until I was almost a teenager.

When I was wee it was Coronation St at nights, Emmerdale Farm at tea time and Take The High Road at my Gran's As I got older it was Neighbours and Home and Away at tea time but when I was all grown up I wasn't t home in time for them!

Yep I most definitely was. My gran watched Emmerdale and Coronation who passed it onto my mum, who passed the same practice on to me when I got old enough to watch. There was always soaps on in our house though as my mum used to watch Emmerdale, Coronation, Eastenders, Neighbours, Home and Away, Take The High Road, A Country Practice and The Flying Doctors! Oh and Casualty right from when it first started! Thankfully she hasn't passed all those down to me as although I watched them a bit I wasn't bothered about them other than ED. Something she has passed down though is the intolerance of anyone speaking when the soaps are on, my gran wouldn't allow a thing to be said when she was watching Emmerdale no matter how important, everything had to stop and shut up when the music started and my mum is exactly the same. The house could have blown up and all they'd be bothered about is if Emmerdale was still on. I'm not quite as extreme but I don't like people talking to me when I've settled down to watch something.

Apparently even as a baby when the corrie theme tune was on I would be quiet and when I was 2 I named my doll Audrey after Audrey Roberts

I was. My first memory of soaps were when Richard Hillman killed Maxine Peacock in Corrie - "you should have stayed at the party, Maxine." That was about the time when I started actually paying attention to what my parents watched, rather than went off to do something else while the soaps were on.

Thinking about it, I was young when we watched Dallas, Dynasty,Knots Landing, The Colbys and Falcon Crest were always on!In the early 80s it seemed like everyone watched the glossy US soaps and also Coronation St. I didn't t watch Brookside or EastEnders until I was an older child. Funnily enough, I' m the only tv soap fan in my family now ( although my Mum and sister love The Archers) - so I guess it was down to lack of choice

I definitely was! Brought up watching Coronation Street, Brookside, Home & Away and EastEnders in this house - very rarely watch Home & Away anymore but still love Coronation Street and EastEnders

I remember being very upset as a three or four year old when Daphne from Neighbours died - like the OP a Neighbours storyline is an early memory!

My older sister used to watch Eastenders but I wasn't really supposed to, so that made it kind of exciting when she'd babysit and I saw it. Don't remember that much before Sharon tapegate though.

The Archers has always been around as my mum listened to it - I remember Roy blinding Usha and then John dying.

We'd have EastEnders on in our house every now and then when I was young, my older sister would watch it but they weren't hardcore fans in my house. We were all casual viewers. It did catch my attention and compel me to watch, but being a kid you're more interested in running around the living room and causing mayhem to be honest.

One of my earliest memories of EE and the image that sticks most in my mind as a child was of Pauline Fowler walloping Arthur over the head with a frying pan . I remember playing with my toy cars and saying, "What the flippin' heck is wrong with that granny?! " and then carried on playing.

I didn't really become an avid viewer until the mid-late 90s (likely 1996), but I was addicted by the year 2000 - which IMO is the show's best year by far and I don't think any soap will surpass it. It hasn't come anywhere close to the heights of that great year unfortunately and I've lost hope that it ever will with the succession of terrible EPs, which is probably why I only watch one or two episodes a month now. I regard EE as my first love. But I have grown out of it sadly.

As for the other soaps, I started watching Neighbours regularly in 2000 when the Scullys and Kennedys were the two major families and the cast was more stable, it was a really solid soap back then. But it became piss poor and unrecognisable IMO around the late 2000s and onwards. I have started to enjoy the show again recently though because it feels like there's more of a stable cast of characters again who are being developed by the writers and all the actors aren't leaving after a few months.

I have faint memories as a child of Home & Away back in the 90s, I remember characters like Selina and Jessie, but I didn't start watching it regularly until it returned on Channel 5 around 2001 or 2002.. Same goes for Hollyoaks, started watching it in 2001, when every woman in the village seemed to be blonde . Thanks to Kirkwood, the show has become completely ludicrous now. Mind you, I still regard Kirkwood's first stint as the greatest era of the show, so he ain't all that bad!

You'll probably have noticed I've mentioned the year 2000 a lot... It's actually the year I started secondary school. I was still in that discovery stage in my life and trying to understand the world at large. Soaps were a form of escapism for me as I didn't enjoy school at all being as it was a volatile environment for me and I use to get into a lot of fights (not my fault, honest ), so I naturally veered towards these shows about people living everyday lives and seeing people struggle like me.

Anyway, I'm more of a Emmerdale viewer nowadays. I'm what you would call a Emmerdale convert. Which still surprises me to this day, because if my adult self told my teenage self that I would be a Emmerdale viewer in the year 2016, I would laugh at my adult self and tell him to do one. Admittedly I use to laugh at Emmerdale and dismiss it as a 'farm show' with cardboard acting. But I really do think Emmerdale has evolved into a very watchable, great soap now and established itself as the top soap. Now I am hooked on it, how things change .
IMO it's the most consistent soap and whilst it may resort to a lot of repetition like its rivals, when it's at its best - it's really good I think.